Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

European Economic Community

Mr. Marten: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs when he next proposes to meet the Council of Ministers of the European Community.

The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Mr. Geoffrey Rippon): My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and I meet Foreign Ministers of the Six fairly frequently. With the completion of the negotiations we have no present plans to meet the council as such.

Mr. Marten: Has my right hon. and learned Friend noted the view expressed in Brussels last week about the possible inability of Britain to pay the bill for entry into the Common Market? If this matter is raised in the Council of Ministers, will my right hon. and learned Friend say that in Britain that view is largely shared?

Mr. Rippon: That sounds to me wildly improbable. I have not heard a suggestion of that kind and I do not foresee a difficulty of that kind. If it were to arise, we would face it in the ordinary way.

Sir R. Russell: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how paragraph 101 of the White Paper, Command Paper No. 4715, is affected by Article 135, paragraph 3, of Command Paper No. 4862-I, in so far as exports of agricultural, horticultural and pastoral foodstuffs from Australia to Great Britain are concerned.

Mr. Rippon: With regard to trade in agricultural products, paragraph 101 of Cmnd. 4715 refers to arrangements applicable during the transitional period for third countries. Article 135 of the Act annexed to the Instruments of Accession to the Treaties of the European Communities relates exclusively to intra-Community trade.

Sir R. Russell: Can the Government give an assurance that there will be some


protection in the treaty against possible dislocation of trade in Australian dairy produce which was promised in paragraphs 86 and 101 of the White Paper?

Mr. Rippon: My hon. Friend should look at Protocol 16 of the Act of the Conference. He will see that this is relevant to his Question.

Rhodesia

Mr. Wall: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a further statement on the progress of the work of the Pearce Commission in Rhodesia.

Mr. William Hamilton: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a further statement on the progress made by the Pearce Commission in Rhodesia; and whether he is still satisfied that full and free political expression is being allowed to all Rhodesians of all races.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he will make a statement about the situation in Rhodesia.

Mr. Molloy: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on recent developments in Rhodesia.

Mr. Clinton Davis: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a further statement on the activities of the Pearce Commission in Rhodesia.

Mr. Robert Hughes: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a further statement on the progress of the work of the Pearce Commission in Rhodesia.

The Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Joseph Godber): The Commissioners are continuing their operations in different parts of the country. In a statement issued on 7th February, Lord Pearce said that in certain circumstances he might have to conclude that there have been infringements of the agreement that normal political activities would be permitted during the test of acceptability. My

right hon. Friend has made representations to Mr. Smith about the matters to which Lord Pearce referred. Lord Pearce none the less still believes that the commission can usefully continue with its work, and Her Majesty's Government accept his judgment on this.

Mr. Wall: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the two months' delay in sending out the Pearce Commission may prove fatal to the settlement terms? What plans do the Government have in the event of a "No" by the Africans?

Mr. Godber: I do not think there was any undue delay, although I know that my hon. Friend has held this view. It is far too early to give a view about what should be done in the event of such a reply from Lord Pearce, and I therefore feel that we must await the outcome of the Commission before reaching a conclusion.

Mr. Hamilton: Is it not the case that Her Majesty's Government have already made it clear that irrespective of what Lord Pearce and his Commission say, the Government intend to carry out the agreement that has been reached between Mr. Ian Smith and the Foreign Secretary? May we have an undertaking that if the Pearce Commission says that African opinion is against the proposals, the Government will continue with sanctions?

Mr. Gobber: In the first part of that supplementary question the hon. Gentleman is completely wrong; he makes a completely inaccurate assumption. We must await the reply from Lord Pearce and decide what to do in the light of his report.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: Does not the fact that President Kaunda, unlike Mr. Smith, has found it necessary to lock up practically the entire Opposition show that it is very difficult to have in that part of Africa normal political activity as we understand it here without relapse into intimidation, violence and confusion?

Mr. Hamilton: Nonsense.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: It is not nonsense. It is a fact.
Can my right hon. Friend say when we are likely to hear the decision of the Commissioners as to whether there is


widespread intimidation of Africans in Rhodesia?

Mr. Godber: I think it is fair to say, in answer to the first part of my hon. Friend's supplementary question, that ideas about normal political activity are certainly different in this country from what they are in parts of Africa. I really do not believe that I can add anything at this stage in reply to the second part.

Mr. Molloy: Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that Her Majesty's Government still have responsibility for Rhodesia? Does he agree that the treatment of the Todds is utterly disgraceful? Is it not about time that decent people in that country, white and black, were encouraged by a statement from the British Government condemning the unscrupulous renegades there? Will the right hon. Gentleman ensure that sanctions and everything else that can possibly be imposed on the illegal régime is imposed in the name of British democracy and all for which this House stands?

Mr. Godber: There is a later Question specifically about the Todds. I cannot accept the extreme views which the hon. Gentleman is expressing.

Mr. Molloy: Extreme?

Mr. Godber: We are seeking to find an honourable settlement to the matter.

Mr. Davis: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that on the Frost Programme on television last night Mr. Smith was shown as being evasive and shifty and a pathological liar? What reliance can this or any Government plan on the word of such a man? What steps are we taking, like the New Zealand Government, to condemn the attitude of the Smith régime towards the Todds?

Mr. Godber: I am afraid that I did not have the pleasure of seeing the programme to which the hon. Member refers. We are concerned with the proposals for a settlement negotiated by my right hon. Friend, and it is with this that we are dealing.

Mr. Healey: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that Lord Pearce himself has now publicly condemned the Smith régime for breaking its promise to the British Government to allow normal political activities? In the case of the Todds

and the Chinamanos, can the right hon. Gentleman say what representations the Government have made in the light of Lord Pearce's statement? Further, can he tell the House what progress is being made for the sending of an all-party delegation to Rhodesia, given the fact that it is now several weeks since the Liberal and Labour Parties nominated their representatives?

Mr. Godber: It is not quite right to say that Lord Pearce has condemned in the terms which the right hon. Gentleman has used. I have indicated that subsequent to that statement by Lord Pearce my right hon. Friend sent a special message to Mr. Smith in relation to the matters raised by the right hon. Gentleman, but I cannot give any indication of the contents of that message.
In regard to the proposed all-party delegation, I have only this morning received a further long message from Mr. Smith. His reply remains equivocal, and we are sending a further message asking him to let us have a clear answer. The position at this stage is that Mr. Smith apparently remains unwilling to accept an all-party mission which includes the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey) or the hon. Members for Eton and Slough (Miss Lestor) and for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. David Steel).

Mr. Terry Davis: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs when he now expects the Pearce Commission to leave Rhodesia.

Mr. Godber: It is entirely at the discretion of Lord Pearce to decide how long the Commission needs to remain in Rhodesia. At his Press conference in London on 20th December, Lord Pearce said that he hoped that the work of the Commission on the ground in Rhodesia could be completed in two months.

Mr. Terry Davis: Does not the right hon. Gentleman have any idea how much longer it will take for the Pearce Commission to make its report? Is no timetable available?

Mr. Godber: I thought that my right hon. Friend made it very clear that this was left to Lord Pearce. I think it right that it should be left to Lord Pearce rather than that he should be given a


specific timetable. It is for him to judge what is needed to carry out as full an investigation as he requires. I do not think I would wish to press him in this respect.

Mr. Healey: In the light of the astonishing reply given by the Minister a moment ago that Mr. Smith has rejected all the members of the delegation proposed by the Liberal and Labour Parties, and as even if the Commission is there for two months only three weeks will remain for an all-party delegation to go out and observe its work, can the right hon. Gentleman tell us whether he or his right hon. Friend ever intend to stand up for the rights of this House in the matter?

Mr. Godber: It is rather unwise of the right hon. Gentleman to seek to make that point again and again in this House, as he does, when he knows perfectly well that the Government of which he was a member were quite unable to enforce their wishes in regard to Rhodesia. We have to accept the position as it is on the ground, and it is no good pretending that we are in a position to enforce the Government's views.

Mr. Healey: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. There are still several more Questions on the Order Paper on Rhodesia.

Mr. Clinton Davis: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a further statement concerning the imprisonment of Mr. Garfield Todd and Miss Judith Todd by the illegal régime in Rhodesia.

Mr. Godber: As the House is aware, Mr. Garfield Todd and his daughter have been in detention since 18th January. Lord Pearce stated on 7th February that the Rhodesian authorities have not as yet revealed to the Commission the evidence on which the decision to detain Mr. Todd and his daughter was based.

Mr. Davis: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that that is an utterly disgraceful reply and that the Government seem to be washing their hands of the whole affair? What representations have they made to the Rhodesia Government about it? Do they approve or disapprove of the situation? What do they think about the treatment being

afforded to this very sick man by the Smith régime? Does the Minister damned well care about the whole issue?

Mr. Godber: The hon. Gentleman should not misrepresent the Government's position. I was giving a factual reply on this point, which is what I thought the hon. Member wanted. The Government regret the detention and have said so many times. We also deplore the absence of any reason for the detention. We have made that abundantly clear. We have made representations on a number of occasions, including a further representation by my right hon. Friend himself towards the end of last week.

Mr. John Mendelson: Is the Minister aware that on Thursday during business questions the Leader of the House assured me on the point I then raised concerning Mr. Garfield Todd's health and said specifically that new representations would be made? Perhaps I may be allowed again to put the point I then made: that in view of the statement made by Mrs. Todd, which the right hon. Gentleman's Department must have seen, about the serious effect on the deteriorating state of health of Mr. Todd that the degree of detention he is suffering will have, his release on medical and compassionate grounds is now absolutely urgent. Will the right hon. Gentleman fulfil the promise which the Leader of the House gave me last week to make new representations on those lines?

Mr. Godber: Mr. Todd's health is a matter about which we are very much concerned, and we have already made representations. His daughter's health is the subject of a later Question.

Mr. Alexander W. Lyon: Will the right hon. Gentleman also make representations about the Chinamanos? Mr. Chinamano also has a heart condition. His five children, aged between nine and 14, are left alone at home to look after themselves during this period of detention. It really is unforgivable if we are to concentrate only on the two white internees as distinct from the two black internees. The usual reply which the Government give about these representations is that they have no power in Rhodesia, but although they may have no power there they do have influence as a result of the present stage of the proposals that have been put forward by


both sides for the settlement of the dispute. Do the Government have—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I have allowed the hon. Gentleman to go so far but I can allow him to go no further. In fact, I think that, strictly speaking, this supplementary question does not arise out of the Question on the Order Paper. I cannot allow the hon. Member to go further.

Mr. Godber: Mr. and Mrs. Chinamano were directly included in the last representations that were made. There is no question here of differentiating between white and black.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what discussions he has had with the United States authorities regarding their decision to endorse the lifting of sanctions against imports into the United States of America of non-ferrous metals from Rhodesia; which metals are affected by this decision; and what was the proportion of total Rhodesian exports of each of the metals affected going to the United States of America in the last full year prior to the unilateral declaration of independence.

Mr. Godber: On the first part of my Friend's Question the answer is "None, Sir". On my hon. Friend's second and third questions, with permission, I am circulating such details as are available in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that reply. I am sure that these details will be inspected by hon. Members on both sides with great interest. Can he tell the House whether the Government have any plans for moving the Beira Patrol to the mouth of the Hudson River?

Mr. Godber: I do not think that there is any proposal by the Government to make any changes in present dispositions in regard to sanctions until we hear the outcome of the proposals and the report of the Pearce Commission.

Mr. Thorpe: Is the Minister aware that his reply, "None", is quite staggering? Will he confirm that Rhodesia is a British responsibility; that the reference was made by the predecessor Government

to the United Nations; that mandatory sanctions were imposed by the Security Council and have never been revoked; that the United States is in breach of these mandatory sanctions, and that no representations whatever have been made by the Government?

Mr. Godber: I note the right hon. Gentleman's surprise, but when one considers the massive evasion of sanctions which has taken place elsewhere I am not prepared to single out for criticism a country which has up to now upheld sanctions to the full and is now making a strictly limited relaxation.

Following are the details:

The operative clause of the United States of America Military Procurement Bill reads:—
Section 10. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, on and after January 1 1972, the President may not prohibit or regulate the importation into the United States of any material determined to be strategic and critical pursuant to the provisions of this Act, if such material is the producet of any foreign country or area not listed as a communist-dominated country or area in General Headnote 3 (D) of the tariff schedules of the United States (19 U.S.C. 1202), for so long as the importation into the United States of material of that kind which is the product of such communist-dominated countries or areas is not prohibited by any provision of law.
It is not known precisely what Rhodesian products might be covered by the U.S.A. Treasury's General Licence which has subsequently been issued in implementation of this Clause, but for the non-ferrous minerals which have so far been mentioned by the United States' authorities as possibly affected, the percentage figures requested by my honourable Friend are as follows:




Proportion OF Domestic Exports of each commodity exported to the U.S.A. in 1965 




Per cent.


1
Chrome ore
46


2
Ferro-chrome
nil


3
Copper




(a) Refined, unwrought
12.6



(b) Concentrates, bar and rod and copper alloys
nil


4
Manganese
nil


5
Nickel
nil


6
Asbestos
9

Source: Rhodesian Annual Statement of External Trade 1965.

Mr. Hugh Jenkins: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Common wealth Affairs how many political prisoners are detained without trial in Rhodesia.

Mr. Godber: My latest information is that the total of those held under ministerial detention orders is 67. That total includes Mr. Todd and his daughter, and Mr. and Mrs. Chinamano. Some people are also being held under 30-day police detention orders, but the Rhodesian authorities have not made available information about the number involved.

Mr. Jenkins: The right hon. Gentleman has regretted and deplored, but would he not at least go to the length of protesting and condemning? Would he not send someone to Rhodesia particularly to see Miss Todd—myself if he likes, or someone from this side of the House?

Mr. Rost: The hon. Gentleman would be locked up, too.

Mr. Jenkins: Perhaps so. Let us see whether they have the guts to lock up a Member of this House. Would the right hon. Gentleman put the matter to the test by sending out someone from this side of the House, someone known to Miss Todd and who would be trusted by her to bring back a message to the right hon. Gentleman, especially in view of Mr. Smith's studied ignorance of this matter, as we saw on television last night?

Mr. Godber: I prefer to leave this to Lord Pearce and his colleagues and to the representations made by my right hon. Friend.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: What is the corresponding figure for political prisoners detained in Zambia?

Mr. Godber: I have no information about that.

Mr. Foley: Would the right hon. Gentleman confirm or deny that Mr. Smith's statement broadcast on television last night that there were about 1,000 prisoners is an immense departure from the situation that existed when the Foreign Secretary and Mr. Smith reached agreement in their talks in Salisbury? Would the right hon. Gentleman explain to the House the extent of the Pearce Commission's responsibilities? In the House it is always said that the Pearce Commission must decide. When representations are made to the Commission one is referred back to the House. I left nine questions with Lord Justice Pearce over two weeks ago. One of them related to the number of detainees

and whether representations had been made. I am still awaiting a reply. Will the right hon. Gentleman guarantee that I will get a reply from the Pearce Commission?

Mr. Godber: I have just given a specific reply about the number of detainees. Three different categories are involved: the detainees for which I have given the figure of 67; those detained under the 30-day arrangement, figures for which I have not been given; and others which must be included in the figure I am told that Mr. Smith gave on television. I am told that many of those were people arrested in connection with last month's riots. Many have been tried. Some have been convicted and some have been released.

Mr. Meacher: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs by how much he estimates that Rhodesian imports and exports have been reduced annually since the unilateral declaration of independence as a result of sanctions.

Mr. Godber: According to Rhodesian statistics, the value of both imports and exports fell sharply after the imposition of sanctions. The value of imports had virtually recovered by 1970, the latest year for which figures are available. Exports had also risen again from £107 million in 1968 to £153 million in 1970, although this was still substantially below the 1965 figure.
I will, with permission, circulate such figures as are available in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Meacher: In view of the drop in the figures which the Minister has given, will he acknowledge that it was sanctions, and especially shortages of foreign exchange, which alone brought Mr. Smith to the negotiating table? If the Pearce Commission brings back the answer "No", will the right hon. Gentleman accept that the full maintenance of sanctions is the only policy, short of military intervention, which can extract real concessions from a police State dictator?

Mr. Godber: The hon. Gentleman had better look at the figures which I shall be publishing, and I think he will see that although sanctions were effective in the early days they have been substantially


eroded according to the figures available at the present time. Therefore, although they have had their effect in helping to bring about the discussions, they are one aspect of the matter but I would not think they are the whole.

Sir F. Bennett: Could my right hon. Friend say whether such reductions as have been achieved have been achieved as a result of sacrifices in regard to British exports and imports and those of others who have obeyed sanctions? Could he give comparable figures to show how they have been maintained in the case of France, Germany and Japan, for instance?

Mr. Godber: I cannot, without notice, give the other figures to which my hon. Friend refers, but Britain has loyally observed sanctions up to the hilt. I only wish that others had done the same.

Mr. Alexander W. Lyon: Were the figures given at constant prices? In addition to giving figures about trade, would the right hon. Gentleman also give the figures relating to investment? Is it not essential that we maintain sanctions if the present proposals come to nothing?

Mr. Godber: The figures were not at constant prices. There will be some degree of inflation, but it is only one part of the story. It is not the whole part. There-is no question that there has been increasing evasion of sanctions, as the hon. Gentleman must know.

Following are the figures:


RHODESIAN IMPORTS AND EXPORTS 1965–1970



£ million



Imports
Exports


1965
139
184


1966
99
113


1967
109
110


1968
121
107


1969
116
132


1970
137
153

Source: Rhodesian Monthly Digest of Statistics.

Notes: For the sake of comparability these figures are given in terms of the present sterling equivalent of Rhodesian currency.

Mr. Whitehead: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what information has now been supplied to him by the Pearce Commission regarding the policy of testing opinion on the proposed Rhodesian

settlement by unscheduled stops in outlying areas; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Godber: None, Sir. It is for the Pearce Commission to decide the best means of carrying out its task. It will report its findings in due course in its report.

Mr. Whitehead: Would the right hon. Gentleman convey to the Pearce Commission that if the report of its intention to alter its schedule to avoid intimidation at the meetings which it visits is correct. this has two serious disadvantages in the job that the Commission is doing? First, the Commission is accepting the Smith régime's valuation of intimidation as coming on the African side and, secondly, by not telling people where it is going, the Commission will see far fewer people.

Mr. Godber: As a result of the hon. Gentleman's Question I made specific inquiries and I have no knowledge of any unscheduled stops. The Pearce Commission is making such arrangements as it thinks right with regard to the people it sees. There are accusations of intimidation on both sides. The Pearce Commission has taken note of all this and will bear it in mind in any report that it makes.

Mr. Tapsell: Has my right hon. Friend's attention been drawn to the protest which the New Zealand Government have made to the Smith régime about the illegal detention of Mr. Todd and Miss Todd? Can he explain why the British Government have still made no such protest?

Mr. Godber: I do not know whether my hon. Friend was present in the Chamber when I answered questions on this matter earlier. I made quite clear our attitude to this and I cannot add to what I then said.

Mr. Foley: In making inquiries of the Pearce Commission as to its method of work, did Her Majesty's Government ascertain the extent to which the Commission was using a qualitative or quantitative assessment in terms of public opinion? If so, on what basis was the criterion to be established? If not, is it not important that the Minister and the House should know exactly the methods of work of the Commission?

Mr. Godber: The Commission was given the task to use such means as it thought appropriate. As I understand it, it has used both methods in its investigation, and it should no doubt report fully the methods it has used as well as the result of its investigations.

Mr. Henry Higgins

Mr. Lipton: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what action was taken by the British Ambassador in Madrid to find employment in Spain for the British matador, Mr. Henry Higgins.

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Anthony Royle): In the course of conversation on a social occasion with the Spanish Minister of Tourism, the Ambassador mentioned that he had heard that Mr. Henry Higgins was having some difficulty in obtaining engagements in Spain and he expressed the hope that there was in this no discrimination against a British subject as such.

Mr. Lipton: Is it not the duty of a British ambassador to project British attitudes and the British way of life? How is it that, either officially or unofficially, our man in Madrid should go out of his way to find for a British subject work which is illegal in Britain?

Mr. Royle: There is no inference to be drawn of the sort which the hon. Member has just drawn. The ambassador was simply interested in helping a British subject who was encountering difficulties in his profession. Bull fighting is not illegal in Spain. As I have said, the ambassador was simply interested in helping a British subject.

Mr. Jeffrey Archer: Would my hon. Friend agree that Mr. Higgins' talents would be better spent in this country fighting the bull that comes from the Opposition Front Bench?

Mr. Royle: I have no doubt that Mr. Higgins would certainly enjoy doing that very much.

Mr. Lipton: As I am not a member of the Opposition Front Bench and in view of the unsatisfactory nature of that reply, I beg to give notice that I shall seek to raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Israel-Egypt Dispute

Mr. Madel: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what proposals Her Majesty's Government have for resolving the present deadlock in the Israel-Egypt dispute; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Godber: Her Majesty's Government remain ready to help in any way we can to find a way forward. As the House is aware, my right hon. Friend will be visiting Israel in March.

Mr. Madel: Would my right hon. Friend agree that the opening of the Suez Canal would go some way towards reducing tension between Egypt and Israel, and that, in order to do this, Israel should move perhaps 10 miles eastwards from the canal and Egyptian missiles should be removed from the canal zone? Once the canal is open, may we look for a reduction in the price of oil to this country?

Mr. Godber: I am sure that my hon. Friend's proposal is laudable. Indeed this was the basis of the United States' proposal put forward and pursued energetically last year, from March onwards. We indicated that we should be perfectly willing to support any proposal of that kind if results could be achieved. Unfortunately, so far it has not been possible to make any progress in this matter. On the last point, it would be some time before we could hope to arrive at that situation.

Mr. Will Griffiths: Do the Government consider that the Israeli Government's policy of permanent occupation and development of part of the Golan Heights and the exploitation of certain resources in Sinai, all with the appearance of permanency, is a blot on attempts to find a peaceful solution? Do the Government still base their policy on the Security Council resolution of November, 1967?

Mr. Godber: Yes. The last part of the hon. Gentleman's supplementary question covers this point. It is on resolution 242 of the Security Council that we base our position. As the hon. Gentleman will recall, that resolution calls for withdrawal from the occupied


territories is a matter subject to dispute. But this is the essence of the problem.

Mr. Kaufman: I trust that in replying to my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Exchange (Mr. Will Griffiths), the right hon. Gentleman is not accepting the statement made by my hon. Friend in the preliminary to his question as there is no evidence whatever that the Israelis are in permanent occupation of these areas. Will the right hon. Gentleman pursue the line suggested by his hon. Friend, as the Israelis have now made it evident that they are willing for partial agreement, to begin with, based upon a withdrawal from the Suez Canal?

Mr. Godber: I assure the hon. Gentleman that I seldom accept the preliminaries of any question put from the Opposition side of the House. On the specific matter, we have to look very carefully at the latest comments from the Israelis, but we have a long way to go in making progress. I have discussed this matter with Dr. Jarring on a number of occasions. I am most anxious to make progress but there is not enough give in the situation yet.

Central Treaty Organisation

Mr. Wilkinson: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he will seek an early meeting of Foreign Ministers of member nations of the Central Treaty Organisation.

Mr. Anthony Hoyle: No, Sir. Ministers of the CENTO countries are due to meet in London in May for the annual Ministerial Council. My right hon. Friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary will be leading the British delegation.

Mr. Wilkinson: Does my hon. Friend believe that maintenance of an effective collective security system in the Middle East is of prime importance, as Soviet influence is growing in the Western Indian Ocean? In the course of the conference in May, will he try to ascertain from the Pakistan representatives what their attitude will be to the CENTO alliance since the change of Government in Pakistan?

Mr. Boyle: We agree that CENTO is extremely important and, as my right hon. Friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary said in the House on

31st January, we hope that Pakistan will continue to be a member of the organisation.

British Honduras (Exercises)

Dr. Gilbert: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations he has now received from the Government of Guatemala with respect to current British Army and Royal Navy exercises in the area of British Honduras; and what reply he has sent.

Mr. Godber: The Guatemalan authorities made representations to Her Majesty's Consul in Guatemala City about these exercises. British Honduras is, of course, a British dependent territory and Her Majesty's Consul has been instructed to make clear to the Guatemalan Government that the movement of troops in British territory is a matter for Her Majesty's Government. The movements in question were part of a long planned exercise in the Caribbean area.

Dr. Gilbert: May we at least have a guarantee from the Minister that there will be no more flamboyant exercises of this sort in what is a highly sensitive area? Second, if it has now been proved so easy to move troops, aircraft carriers and so on to British Honduras in such numbers and at such short notice, why is it not possible to give a defence guarantee to the British Honduran Government if it became independent?

Mr. Godber: I can only assume from that supplementary question that the hon. Gentleman did not listen to my answer. As I said, this was part of a long planned exercise. That is why it was possible to do it with speed. It has nothing to do with flamboyance. This is a properly planned exercise still going on in the Caribbean area. There is always a commitment in regard to British Honduras. We retain troops in British Honduras and we intend to continue to do so as long as we have a responsibility there.

Mr. Dodds-Parker: Will my right hon. Friend consider giving wider publicity in future to these annual troop movements? These were widely known in the area months before the incident occurred.

Mr. Godber: We will see what we can do to give wider publicity. Information


had been given in the area, as my hon. Friend says.

Mr. Healey: Is it not the case that the participation of the carrier "Ark Royal" in these exercises had not been notified in advance, not even to the Government of British Honduras, and the people of British Honduras were widely reported to be disturbed by some of the activities carried out? Was not this a propaganda stunt by the carrier lobby in the Ministry of Defence? Will the right hon. Gentleman seek to persuade the Secretary of State for Defence to re-establish political control over the Services in these sensitive areas?

Mr. Godber: That is a very strange supplementary question. There is no basis for it. These exercises, including the participation of the aircraft carrier, had been planned in the area. The aircraft carrier is still in the area carrying out these exercises. This had nothing to do with any lobby in regard to any particular type of armament. The right hon. Gentleman is hopelessly wrong about this, as he usually is.

Civil Servants

Mr. Selwyn Gummer: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many civil servants of grades one to four there are in his Department; and how many of these are women.

Mr. Anthony Boyle: There are 501 officers in grades one to four of the Diplomatic Service and equivalent specialist grades. Nine of these are women.

Mr. Gummer: I thank my hon. Friend for that reply. Is it not rather surprising that of 501 officers only nine are women? Will he look into the arrangements which are made for recruiting to ensure that women have a fair share of the number of jobs which are going? Would it not improve his own working conditions if he were to do so?

Mr. Royle: It is in practice difficult for a married woman to reconcile the obligation of mobility accepted by all members of the Diplomatic Service with family life and a husband's career. Consequently; women members of the service usually resign on marriage, and this factor largely accounts for the small number

of women in the senior grades. However. resignation is not obligatory, provided that the woman can continue to accept the obligations of the service. There is no bias in the selection process for the Diplomatic Service run under the auspices of the Civil Service Commission.

Seychelles

Mr. Michael McNair-Wilson: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he intends to seek to pay an official visit to the Seychelles in the near future.

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Anthony Kershaw): My right hon. Friend has no plans to do so at present.

Mr. McNair-Wilson: Is my hon. Friend aware that the future political relationship of the Seychelles with the United Kingdom is causing a considerable amount of political dissent in the Seychelles? Would not a Ministerial visit do much to clear the air?

Mr. Kershaw: The present constitution of the Seychelles has been in operation for only just over 12 months. It is reasonable to see how it will work out. I am aware of the desire of the people of the Seychelles to have a close association with Britain, which is heartily reciprocated.

Mr. Mather: Will my hon. Friend bear in mind the desire of the great majority of the people of Seychelles for closer ties with Britain on a permanent basis? Will my hon. Friend consider ways and means of achieving this?

Mr. Kershaw: These considerations are in our minds. It is, perhaps, early days to make further progress in this direction.

Brazil (British Ambassador's Residence)

Mr. Luce: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what plans he has for the future of the British Ambassador's residence in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Mr. Kershaw: Her Majesty's Embassy in Brazil will move early this year from Rio de Janeiro to Brasilia. We cannot yet take a final decision on the future


of the residence in Rio de Janeiro since there will be a continuing need for the ambassador to spend substantial periods of the year in that city. Plans for the longer term are under study in the light of recent reports by Diplomatic Service inspectors.

Mr. Luce: When my hon. Friend makes a decision on this matter, will he bear in mind that with the British Ambassador moving to Brasilia there is scope for an imaginative decision on the future of the British residence in Rio de Janeiro? In view of the growing importance of Brazil as a trading partner with Great Britain and of the enormous fund of good will towards this country, will my hon. Friend consider using this building as both a trading and a cultural centre for Great Britain?

Mr. Kershaw: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. It is a very important building in Rio de Janeiro, recently completed. We will bear closely in mind the considerations my hon. Friend has put forward in finding a future use for the building.

Mr. Foley: In the light of recent events in Brazil, will the hon. Gentleman look again at the question who determines foreign policy vis-à-vis Brazil? Is it the Ministry of Defence or the Foreign and Commonwealth Office?

Mr. Kershaw: The Foreign and Commonwealth Office is in charge of that matter.

Mr. Marten: Can we have an assurance that the residence will remain in British hands and not be sold or handed over to anybody else, because it is a magnificent monument to the late Ernest Bevin?

Mr. Kershaw: The building is indeed, as my hon. Friend says, a magnificent monument, and we must be rather careful about how it is used in the future. It is rather too large for our ordinary use once the main embassy has moved to Brasilia, but we will have a continuing need of it for a few years yet.

Belgian Trawlers (Fishing Limit)

Mr. Bowden: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he will protest to the Belgian Government about persistent

breaches of the 6-mile limit by Belgian trawlers off Brighton and the Sussex coast.

Mr. Anthony Boyle: I have no evidence of persistent breaches of the Emile limit by Belgian trawlers. The circumstances under which one Belgian skipper was charged for stowage of gear offences on 31st January were described to the House by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food on 3rd February in reply to my hon. Friend.—[Vol. 830, c. 192.]

Mr. Bowden: Is my hon. Friend aware that the offshore fishermen of Brighton and Sussex will regard that as a most unsatisfactory reply? On 26th January a number of Belgian trawlers were seen by the two night watchmen on the Palace Pier in Brighton actually fishing in the area between the two piers. In the light of this and other instances when Belgian trawlers have been fishing within the Emile limit, will my hon. Friend reconsider his reply?

Mr. Royle: Since January, 1971, only seven skippers of Belgian vessels have been charged for offences within British fishing limits. Of these seven, one was for fishing within the 6-mile limit. The remainder were for conservation offences. These figures relate to the whole coast of England and Wales, not merely to the Sussex coast. However, if my hon. Friend has any other evidence that he wishes to give me, I shall be very glad to look at it.

Mr. Russell Johnston: Surely the Minister will accept that the problem is that of catching people. The fact that there are few charges indicates not that there are few breaches, but that there is a lack of success in catching people. Will the hon. Gentleman consider the possibility of discussing with our E.E.C. neighbours, now that the fishing regulations have been agreed, the possibility of joint arrangements for fishery protection so that joint responsibility is taken for the respect of different national limits?

Mr. Royle: There is no doubt that the area is attractive to foreign fishermen and it will benefit from the increased provisions for coastal fishery protection which were announced by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Defence for the Royal Navy on 20th


January. We will certainly consider the hon. Gentleman's suggestions.

Mr. James Johnson: If this is a foretaste of what can, and possibly will, happen if we join the E.E.C., will the hon. Gentleman convey to the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food the feelings of the House and the need to have not merely more fisheries protection vessels patrolling, but helicopters to warn the vessels below of what is happening?

Mr. Royle: The hon. Gentleman has not got this matter quite right. The allegations about what has been occurring have nothing to do with any application to join the European Economic Community.

Laos

Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what steps Her Majesty's Government have recently taken as a Co-Chairman of the 1962 Geneva Agreement guaranteeing the neutrality and integrity of Laos.

Mr. Anthony Royle: We have recently circulated to the other signatory Governments of the 1962 Geneva Agreement a letter from the Prime Minister of Laos protesting at North Vietnamese military aggression in his country. We were obliged to do this unilaterally because the Soviet Co-Chairman would not agree to joint circulation.

Mr. Godman Irvine: Will my hon. Friend bear in mind that North Vietnamese troops who are found in Cambodia must be using Laos to get there, and, as there is no local support for them in Cambodia, would he use that as an additional reason for continuing his good work?

Mr. Royle: I agree with my hon. Friend's comment. We have said in our covering note that Her Majesty's Government consider that the activities of North Vietnamese troops in Laos constitute a flagrant violation of Laotian neutrality and of the 1962 Geneva Agreement.

Nuclear Defence

Mr. Frank Allaun: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will raise the question

of nuclear defence at his next meeting with the French Government.

Mr. Anthony Royle: My right hon. Friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary has no current plans for a meeting with the French Government.

Mr. Allaun: Did the hon. Gentleman note the views of the Prime Minister on the arguments of M. Deniau, the E.E.C. Commissioner, in favour of supplying our military nuclear technique to France? Did the Prime Minister dismiss this as merely wanting to relax the McMahon Act? What other purpose can there be in relaxing the McMahon Act except to provide this military technique to France?

Mr. Royle: I think the hon. Gentleman is well aware that the questions he has put to me are really for my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. However, the Prime Minister's position on the matter of an Anglo-French deterrent in trust for Europe is well known.

Mr. Blaker: While matters of nuclear defence are obviously important, would not the Under-Secretary agree that the present time is particularly auspicious for a move forward towards greater cooperation with France in foreign policy, whether bilaterally or within the context of the Ten? Could he raise this matter with the French Government?

Mr. Royle: I think my hon. Friend knows that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister will be meeting President Pompidou in the very near future, and no doubt all these matters will be discussed between them.

Developing Countries (Finance)

Mr. Oram: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what attitude the British delegation to the forthcoming meeting of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development will take on the subjects of compensatory finance for developing countries suffering unexpected shortfalls in export earnings and the linking of special drawing rights in the International Monetary Fund to development finance.

The Minister for Overseas Development (Mr. Richard Wood): Instructions to the British delegation are still being


discussed, but the Supplementary Financial Measures Scheme put forward in 1964 has attracted little support amongst donor countries and the problems it was intended to ease have been tackled in other ways. The question of linking special drawing rights with aid is being studied by the International Monetary Fund.

Mr. Oram: Will the right hon. Gentleman recognise the urgent need of using U.N.C.T.A.D. III as an opportunity for reconciling the interests of the developing countries with those of the developed world? Since it has been a problem in the last 20 years that the share of export earnings which developing countries have had has been declining, is it not vitally important that Britain should take the initiative, not necessarily in exactly the same way as was done at U.N.C.T.A.D. II but in putting forward some proposals for overcoming the problem?

Mr. Wood: The general purpose that the hon. Gentleman mentioned is obviously the main purpose of the U.N.C.T.A.D. III meeting: that the developed and the developing countries should meet to discuss these things and make constructive suggestions. In fact, there have been a number of developments since these measures were suggested, particularly the supplementary financial measures, and the hon. Gentleman will know that the I.D.A. now plays a much more important part. Its resources have been trebled and there have been other ways in which the necessary finance has been made available to the developing countries in those circumstances.

Mr. Blaker: Is it not regrettable that the United States has not put into effect the generalised preference scheme which was agreed at the last U.N.C.T.A.D. meeting? Are Her Majesty's Government considering what can usefully be done at the forthcoming conference, or before, to encourage the United States to do so?

Mr. Wood: That is a matter for the United States Government. This will also be a matter to be discussed at the meeting.

Mrs. Hart: In view of the tremendous importance of the forthcoming U.N.C.T.A.D. meeting—which, as the

right hon. Gentleman knows, is held only every four years—and in view of the increasing urgency attached to trading with developing countries, could the right hon. Gentleman publish a White Paper on the Government's proposals for their own approach at the U.N.C.T.A.D. meeting?

Mr. Wood: I will certainly consider that.

Mr. Maclennan: What is the Government's present thinking on the desirability and practicability of linking development aid to special drawing rights?

Mr. Wood: As I said in my original answer, this matter is being examined by the International Monetary Fund. I do not wish to be evasive in response to the hon. Gentleman's question but I think it would be difficult to state an attitude until we know the kind of ideas which may emerge from those studies. When we see them, we shall consider what our attitude should be. I should not myself be opposed to a link if the basis for such a link could be established in the International Monetary Fund study.

Tied Aid

Mr. Oram: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what proportion of British aid in the last financial year was tied to the purchase of British goods and services; what proposals he has for changing this proportion; and what steps he is taking to seek to persuade other donor countries to act in unison in this matter.

Mr. Wood: On the basis explained in our memorandum to the Development Assistance Committee, the proportion in 1970 was 64 per cent. I have no immediate proposals for changing our tying rules, but we are considering with other members of the committee what action might be possible now that negotiations for general untying have been suspended.

Mr. Oram: As balance of payments difficulties were always one of the main reasons for the tying of aid, and since those difficulties have now been largely overcome, is there not an opportunity now drastically to reduce the proportion of tied aid, particularly as projects in developing countries with a large element of local cost tend to be neglected under the present arrangements, even


though they may be best for those countries from the development point of view?

Mr. Wood: If he examines what we have recently been doing, the hon. Gentleman will find that we have been reasonably flexible in relation to local costs. I recently discussed this with the Tunisian Government and the Mauritian Government and on both occasions we were fairly forthcoming on the local cost question. In general—I have said this publicly many times—I should like to see progress in untying, but I do not believe that it is possible to do this unilaterally; it is something upon which all donors have to agree together, and then it will be to the advantage of both this country and the developing countries.

Mr. Normanton: Will my right hon. Friend give an assurance to the House and to British industry that in negotiating aid to developing countries generally, and to Pakistan in particular, he will not sacrifice the interests of British industries and those who work in them in pursuing this highly laudable aim?

Mr. Wood: The interests of the developing countries and of British industry are both extremely important, and neither must be neglected.

Pakistan and Bangladesh

Mr. Wilkinson: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he will now resume commodity aid to Pakistan.

Mr. Barnes: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will now make a statement on the Government's aid proposals for Bangladesh.

Mr. Goodhart: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what aid he now proposes to give to Pakistan and Bangladesh in 1972.

Mr. Wood: The Government intend to offer immediate assistance to the Government of Bangladesh by providing a loan to finance all the outstanding contracts which have been placed with British firms by Bangladesh importers under previous aid loans and a further loan to take the place of the British loan money allocated to East Pakistan and not yet committed to contracts. The two loans

amount to £4,835,000. We are also disbursing our existing loans to Pakistan, and a balance of nearly £3 million is still available. We have not yet taken decisions about new assistance for Pakistan.
We are already providing £3 million for relief in Bangladesh, and we have now pledged a contribution for 1972 of £700,000 to U.N.I.C.E.F. One hundred thousand pounds of this is destined for U.N.I.C.E.F. operations in Bangladesh.

Mr. Wilkinson: I thank my right hon. Friend for that full and informative answer. Does he agree that the resumption of commodity aid on a substantial scale to West Pakistan would do more at the present time to improve relations between the United Kingdom and Pakistan than any other measure, as Pakistan's reserves of foreign currency dwindled seriously during the crisis of the past year?

Mr. Wood: As the House knows, my right hon. Friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary attaches the greatest importance to the resumption of these relations. We shall certainly consider the resumption of aid, or the provision of new aid, for Pakistan once the Pakistan Government have decided how to reorganise their economy and to deal with their debt moratorium which is, I think, the urgent matter in this case.

Mr. Goodhart: Following the recent conflict, the economic situation in Bangladesh is even worse than it is in Pakistan. Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind that many people in this country would think it right if virtually all the economic aid which has been earmarked in the past for Pakistan now went to Bangladesh?

Mr. Wood: It was with that kind of consideration in view that I asked one of my officials to go out to Bangladesh—I hope that he is arriving today—and to report to me on what he thinks the urgent needs are.

Mr. Maclennan: Apart from that advice and assistance and, in particular, the loan aid to which the Minister referred, there is the problem of disrupted communications, especially the breakdown of bridges, to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins) has drawn


attention. Have the Government any plans to give practical assistance, by the use of the military, for example, or in any other way, in this connection?

Mr. Wood: I understand from a number of people who have recently been to Bangladesh—in particular, the right hon. Member for Stechford—that the greatest need is to restore communications. It was with this in mind that we sent out Mr. Cross, an expert in bridge construction and reconstruction, who is there at the present time. We are looking also at plans in order to investigate the possibility of direct and speedy British help in the creation and recreation of communications which is so necessary now.

Mr. Pavitt: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will send an expert on cooperatives to Bangladesh to ascertain the aid necessary to restore the Co-operative Training Institute and field education for co-operative officials and non-officials, to examine the co-operative movement in general and to advise on supporting action.

Mr. Wood: I have offered technical assistance to the Government of Bangladesh, but I have had no request yet for the services of an expert on co-operatives. If I receive such a request I shall do my best to meet it.

Mr. Pavitt: Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the most likely way in which Bangladesh will be able to get on its own feet is by the people themselves, through their own mutual institutions such as co-operatives, being able to reconstitute their agricultural and agrarian systems? As the right hon. Gentleman's adviser is over there to look at the situation, might it not be possible to increase the amount of support in this field so as to help the people of Bangladesh quickly to get their credit, marketing and purchasing facilities back to what they were before the crisis?

Mr. Wood: Not only shall I be looking at that matter from here; the official to whom I referred in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Mr. Goodhart) is examining the whole questnon of what technical assistance is necessary in Bangladesh, and obviously this will be one of the matters which he will

discuss if the desire exists in Bangladesh for such a person to go out.

Mrs. Hart: I thank the right hon. Gentleman for what he said on the general question of resumption of aid to Pakistan and Bangladesh which we warmly welcome. As his official will be reporting to him, presumably, on his return next week, on this and related questions, including the matter raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan), namely, the urgent need for transportation relief measures, will the right hon. Gentleman undertake to make a fairly full statement when his official has reported to him so that we may know precisely what the relief position is likely to be?

Mr. Wood: I shall do my best to find an opportunity to do what the right hon. Lady asks.

Mr. Tilney: Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind the immense need for books in Bangladesh since, so often, the occupants of homes where books were found were murdered?

Mr. Wood: There is a need for almost anything, books and everything else. I shall do my best to meet the many needs that there are, though I fear that there will be far more needs than we can possibly meet.

Mr. Molloy: What the right hon. Gentleman said in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Willesden, West (Mr. Pavitt) is most encouraging, and we are grateful for it. In the light of the great interest in this matter, which I am sure the right hon. Gentleman acknowledges, will he put that problem high on the agenda in his inquiries regarding how we can help Bangladesh?

Mr. Wood: I note what the hon. Gentleman says.

Nepal (Gurkha Resettlement)

Mr. Scott-Hopkins: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will instruct Her Majesty's Ambassador to Nepal to give assistance to the Gurkha resettlement organisation in Nepal.

Mr. Wood: My Department has for some time undertaken projects to help former Gurkhas, and it is now planning an expansion of this programme.

Mr. Scott-Hopkins: I am grateful for that reply. Is my right hon. Friend aware that there has been some difficulty in sending out the various things which are needed by the mission, such things as seeds and so on? Will he take it that any help which he can give will be gratefully received by this well worth while mission?

Mr. Wood: I thank my hon. Friend for what he says. I think he will be satisfied with what we are trying to do.

Malaysia and Singapore (Pensions)

Mr. Peel: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (1) in view of the fact that, owing to the terms of the United Kingdom and Federation of Malaya Public Officers Agreement, 1959, the Government of Malaysia have reduced the pensions they awarded and pay in Singapore to retired expatriate officers recruited by the British Government who served on the Malayan Establishment in Malaya and Singapore before those countries were independent, if he will undertake that the shortfall in their pensions will be made good to these pensioners;
(2) owing to the Public Officers Agreement 1963, between the United Kingdom and Singapore, the dependants of retired expatriate officers whom the British Government recruited for service on the Malayan Establishment and who are still contributing to the Singapore Widows and Orphans Pensions Scheme will be paid outside Singapore smaller benefits than those due to them under the scheme in accordance with their current contributions, if he will undertake that the shortfall in benefits will be made good to the dependants concrened.

Mr. Wood: As there is no shortfall in the sterling value of these pensions, the question of Her Majesty's Government making compensatory payments does not arise.

Mr. Peel: As the officers concerned had their pensions reduced by about 14 per cent. because the British Government signed the agreement with Malaysia and subsequently devalued the pound, does not my right hon. Friend feel that the Government have a moral responsibility to make up the deficit if the Malaysian Government will not?

Mr. Wood: The Public Officers Agreement with the Malaysian Government ties all pensions paid externally to the rate of exchange prevailing at the date of the agreement. That means that anyone living in Malaysia or Britain receives a pension as before in the same sterling terms. The difficulty arises with people living in Singapore. Neither the previous Government nor the present Government have ever undertaken to make special arrangements to protect all pensioners from the effect of devaluation, and I cannot do so.

Oral Answers to Questions — QUESTIONS TO MINISTERS

Mr. Tilney: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Is it not possible that the rule that only one Question is allowed to the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs in that capacity before other hon. Members have had a Question should also apply to him in his capacity as Minister for Overseas Development?

Mr. Speaker: That is a point. It is not a point of order, but it is a matter that I hope will be considered through the usual channels.

Orders of the Day — EMERGENCY POWERS

Mr. Speaker: It might be for the convenience of the House if I said a word about how the business should be handled. First, we have the formal Motion to be moved by the Home Secretary. Then there is the second, wider Motion which is debatable only until ten o'clock. Then there is the third Motion, dealing with the regulations, which is debatable for one and a half hours after the previous Motion.

Message on behalf of Her Majesty [9th February] considered:

Message again read:
The Emergency Powers Act, 1920, as amended by the Emergency Powers Act, 1964, having enacted that if it appears to Her Majesty that there have occurred or are about to occur events of such a nature as to be calculated, by interfering with the supply and distribution of food, water, fuel or light, or with the means of locomotion, to deprive the community, or any substantial portion of the community, of the essentials of life, Her Majesty may, by Proclamation, declare that a state of emergency exists:
We Counsellors of State, to whom have been delegated certain Royal functions as specified in Letters Patent dated the 4th day of February, 1972, being of opinion that the present industrial dispute affecting persons employed in the coal mines and the production and distribution of fuel constitutes a state of emergency within the meaning of the said Act of 1920 as so amended, have in pursuance thereof made on Her Majesty's behalf a Proclamation dated the 9th day of February, 1972, declaring that a state of emergency exists.

3.32 p.m.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Reginald Maudling): I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty thanking Her Majesty for the Most Gracious Message sent on Her behalf and communicating to this House that Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother and Her Royal Highness the Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon, to whom had been delegated certain Royal Functions as specified in Letters Patent dated the 4th day of February, 1972, had deemed it proper by Proclamation, made on Her Majesty's behalf and in pursuance of the Emergency Powers Act, 1920, as amended by the Emergency Powers Act, 1964, and dated 9th February, 1972, to declare that a state of emergency exists.

The regulations made under the emergency powers are very similar to those normally moved on occasions when a national emergency has been declared, though they vary in one or two matters to which I will refer.
I should explain to the House—it is certainly my duty to do so—what are the effects of the regulations. The first two regulations are the formal ones about title and interpretation. Regulations 3–5 deal with the control of ports. Regulations 6–15 provide for relaxation in restrictions on road transport. There is a new regulation in this group, No. 11, which gives the Secretary of State for the Environment power to exempt drivers from the permitted hours controls.
Regulations 16–20 relax the obligations and restrictions as to public services and facilities. Here there are two very important regulations. The first is No. 17, which relieves the electricity boards of their statutory obligations about the supply of electricity. The important point to make here is that until the regulations were made the boards could not impose power cuts other than for reasons of their capacity being inadequate. In other words, power cuts to conserve stocks of fuel were not legally possible until the state of emergency had been declared and the regulations made. There is a further new feature of this batch of regulations; namely, that power is being given in the case of both electricity and gas to enable the authorities to enter premises to ensure that control orders are effective. This is a wide power to give. I think the House will agree that it is a necessary power in the circumstances.
Regulations 21–24 enable the Minister concerned to regulate the supply, distribution and price of both fuel and food. It is under this group of regulations that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry has issued directions about the consumption of electricity in industry.
Regulations 25–28 give the appropriate Minister power to control transport services. Regulations 29 and 30 contain powers to requisition chattels, such as vehicles, and to take control of land. Regulations 31–39, the remaining regulations, follow precedent on offences and penalties, to ensure that the regulations are enforceable and are enforced.
That is broadly the effect of this set of regulations, which I have already said follows precedent save for one or two modifications which I think it will generally be agreed were sensible.
The duration of the powers is the duration of the state of emergency, the maximum period, as in the past, being fixed as one month. Should it be necessary at the end of one month to continue the powers, the authority of Parliament would have to be sought.
Those are the regulations before us. The broad purpose of the debate, I understand, is to see whether the House approves that these powers under a state of emergency should be given to the Government.
The use made of the powers to date has been fourfold. The first has been to free the area electricity boards from their statutory obligations. That is done under Regulation 17(1), which enables them to undertake the system of rota cuts, cuts in rotation, which they are now doing, thereby spreading the burden of the reduction of power supply as evenly as possible throughout the country. Secondly, an order was made under Regulation 21 prohibiting the use of electricity for advertising, for display purposes and for floodlighting. Thirdly, an order was made restricting the use of electricity for heating purposes in non-domestic premises such as offices, shops and places of recreation. Fourthly, my right hon. Friend has used the powers given him by the regulations to issue directions to certain consumers restricting their consumption of electricity. Those are the uses that have been made of the powers granted to the Government by these emergency regulations.
The effect on industrial consumption, as my right hon. Friend made clear last week, is, first, that the smaller industrial concerns will suffer the rota cuts which apply to the generality of consumers. Secondly, in the medium range of industrial concerns there will be no use of electric power on Sundays and three weekdays. Thirdly, in the case of the largest industrial concerns, particularly those with continuous process plant, which is so especially important, there will be an equivalent reduction of supplies over the whole period by individual arrangement and individual direction.
Those, briefly, are the powers that have been taken under the emergency, and those are the effects of the orders which have been issued by the Government so far.
The next point that I must take up is whether it is necessary at this moment for the Government to assume these powers. I think this is now quite clear. The Act says:
If at any time it appears to Her Majesty that there has occurred or are about to occur events of such a nature … as to be calculated, by interfering with the supply and distribution of food, water, fuel or light, or with the means of locomotion, to deprive the community, or any substantial portion of the community, of the essentials of life, Her Majesty may, by proclamation, … declare that a state of emergency exists.
There cannot be any doubt that such events exist at present, or that, through the interference with the supply and distribution of fuel or light for the community as a whole, the danger exists. Therefore, it is right to ask the House to confirm that these powers should now be granted to the Government.
It was, of course, clear that if this dispute was prolonged, then at a certain time these conditions were bound to come into being. It was, after all, the purpose of the strike and the purpose of the picketing to prevent the delivery of coal to the power stations. As about 75 per cent. of our power station capacity depends upon the supply of coal, clearly if the strike was prolonged to a certain point an emergency of this kind was bound to arise. This is what is happening now. This is why the emergency powers are justified. The dwindling of the coal supplies to the power stations as a result of the strike has at the same time increased the difficulty of supply of coal both to industry and to domestic consumers, even to priority consumers.
I turn next to the question of the timing of these measures. It is, clearly, very difficult to decide exactly the right moment to introduce a state of emergency. I say again that we must be clear that until a state of emergency is declared the electricity authorities could not introduce power cuts for the purpose of conserving fuel they could only introduce cuts in order to off-shed loads if at any time their generating capacity was overloaded. They could not, therefore, have taken steps before the introduction of the state of emergency to


cut back electricity consumption in order to conserve fuel supplies.
The reasons surrounding the timing of the state of emergency are well known to the House. First, the powers involved in a state of emergency are very great, very sweeping and very widespread in the cutting back involved of the normal freedom of individuals and enterprises. The declaration of a state of emergency is a step which should be taken by any Government only when it is clearly absolutely essential to do so. I do not think the House will disagree with that proposition.
Secondly, the prime objective of the Government in this matter and of everyone concerned, clearly, is to try to reach a settlement to the dispute by agreement, a settlement which takes account both of the fair claims of the miners and of the interests of the community at large. Those interests are very large. While accepting entirely the right of the miners to a fair settlement, one must also stress again that the battle against inflation is one in which the entire community, including the miners themselves, are clearly involved, and no single person in this country could possibly stand to benefit if the battle against inflation were abandoned by any Government. It is very important to bear these factors in mind.
In deciding the timing of a state of emergency, it is right for the Government to consider what effect such a declaration would have on the possibility of reaching by agreement the sort of fair settlement to which I have referred. I am certain that the Opposition would have been fairly ready to accuse us of provocation if we had announced a state of emergency earlier than was absolutely necessary.

Mr. Gerald Kaufman: Could the right hon. Gentleman confirm the very circumstantial report in the Daily Mail today that he himself appealed for sterner action earlier so that the public could be warned but that he was hamstrung by the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and the Minister for Industry?

Mr. Maudling: I have seen many newspaper reports. It is not my job to confirm or deny them. In these matters the responsibility is that of the Government as a whole, and I and all my colleagues

are fully prepared to shoulder any share of any responsibility at any time. These are far too serious matters for that sort of comment.
As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry has said, the effect of picketing upon the power industry was greater than had originally been forecast. A great deal of the coal in the possession of the Central Electricity Generating Board has been immobilised by picketing, and there has been a substantial effect on the supplies of other essential materials, such as flashing oil, for example, and other chemicals. This is a wider form of picketing than has been met in the case of previous disputes. I want to refer later to the whole question of picketing, which is immensely important. While there is a wider form of picketing than has been usual in the past, I would at this stage say that this is not in itself in contravention of the law.
Little in the conserving of fuel would have been obtained in practice by an earlier declaration of a state of emergency, while the opportunities of achieving a solution by agreement might have been severely prejudiced. That was the judgment that we made, and I still believe it to have been wise.

Mr. Arthur Palmer: Did not the Government, particularly the Department of Trade and Industry, in planning ahead for the power supply industry concentrate on coal supply but overlook the importance of having sufficient oil to burn the poor coal now available?

Mr. Maudling: I do not think that is the point. The point is that the extent of picketing has gone wider than experienced in the past, involving the picketing of the movement of not only coal but oil and other things, often at enterprises in no way involved in the consumption of coal themselves.
I come now to the question of picketing, which is very important and, clearly, gives special concern to me in my position as Home Secretary. New issues have been raised by what has happened in the dispute. There is a great deal of public concern, first, as to the extent and nature of the picketing which has taken place and, secondly, as to the dangers of violence, of which hon. Members on both


sides of the House are acutely aware and in which I have a special responsibility.
I will state what the law is on picketing. First, peaceful picketing is lawful and, so long as it is peaceful, it may legally extend beyond the movement of coal to the movement of other commodities. This is the law.
Secondly, obstruction and intimidation are not lawful, and it has been held in the courts that the mere number of pickets present, even though they are behaving entirely peacefully, can itself constitute intimidation. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I am merely giving the House what has been decided by the courts of law. No doubt there have been examples of unlawful picketing and of intimidation. We have all seen on television examples of this intimidation. [Interruption.] I want to deal with this matter thoroughly and I hope the House will listen. There have been a number of arrests made by the police mainly under the general law governing assault and disorderly conduct.

Mr. Richard Kelley: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Is the right hon. Gentleman entitled to quote incidents seen on television as evidence—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I have no power to interfere in the content of a Minister's speech unless he is acting against the rules of the House. Nothing has happened contrary to the rules of the House.

Mr. Kelley: What I intended to convey to the House was that television cameras can roam in any direction and can choose to show incidents which have no relation to the truth.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I am not commenting on the merits of the hon. Member's points. I have to administer the Standing Orders of the House, and there is nothing in the Standing Orders with regard to the activities of television cameras.

Mr. Leslie Spriggs: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. The right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary has now been dealing with oral evidence against the pickets. Since a number of cases are to be heard in the courts this week relating to the arrests to which the right hon. Gentleman has referred, will

you, Sir, rule it out of order for the right hon. Gentleman to give prejudicial evidence before the House today?

Mr. Speaker: I have not heard the right hon. Gentleman say anything about a specific case.

Mr. Maudling: What I was about to say, if the House will listen for a moment, is that I am quite certain that the National Union of Mineworkers does not support violence and intimidation in any way at all. The fact is that, while the union does not support it, there have been occasions when the police have been forced to make arrests. The bulk of the picketing has been peaceful. The reason why it has been so effective—this is a matter which possibly has escaped the notice of the newspapers—is that the other unions have given instructions to their members not to cross the picket lines. Therefore, peaceful picketing has been very effective indeed. But I repeat that there have been enough examples of unlawful picketing—not with the authority of the union—to give rise to considerable public disquiet. I should be failing in my duty as Home Secretary if I did not say that.
This is a difficult problem. It is hard to know when intimidation begins. It is difficult to know in any particular set of circumstances when the right of people to persuade others not to go into a factory becomes intimidation. It is a difficult line to draw in law, and the drawing of the line must be left to chief officers of police. The police have a duty to ensure that those who want to work are not forcibly prevented from doing so. Equally, they have a duty to ensure that those who wish to argue against people going to work are entitled peacefully to do so.
The police have no more difficult job than that of deciding in individual cases when the limit of peaceful picketing has been over-stepped. They have been doing their job extremely well. I support the representations which were made to me the other day by the mining Members to ensure that liaison is as close as possible between police and the official unions—which, as I have said, do not wish to see violence—so as to make sure that the violence which some people have stirred up against the wishes of the public at large, and against the wish of the unions, does not take place. This is the situation as I see it on picketing.
I must express some concern that recent developments are giving rise to a great deal of questioning in the public mind. The right of peaceful picketing, of persuading people not to cross a picket line, is jealously safeguarded—and I understand why. But at the same time there is considerable public concern if it in any way appears that illegal picketing should have prevented coal which is available to the Generating Board being burnt by the board to enable people to keep warm and to keep employed. These are very difficult issues indeed. It would be wrong to try to reach decisions on these matters in the heat of the moment. [Laughter.] These matters are more important than that. The bulk of the picketing to date certainly has been lawful, but has had a considerable effect on the power supply by denying to the Generating Board coal already in its possession which otherwise it would use to provide fuel for the employment of our people.

Mr. Emlyn Hooson: The right hon. Gentleman surely should address his mind to what is really concerning the public, and that is why a state of emergency had to be reached before a court of inquiry was ordered, and also why we should be discussing matters such as picketing when the dispute was allowed to get out of hand.

Mr. Maudling: Picketing has been a feature of the dispute from the beginning. I think I am right in saying that the court of inquiry has been a matter which the union has not been prepared to accept throughout the dispute, despite suggestions having been made to the union on this matter. I thought it right that I should speak on the whole question of the law on picketing since there has been a great deal of public concern on this topic.

Mr. Maurice Orbach: Where?

Mr. Stanley Orme: The Home Secretary is all out of proportion.

Mr. Maudling: No, I am not out of proportion. In my position as Home Secretary I am, of course, rightly concerned about this matter. I have been trying to give hon. Members a balanced account of what has been happening. I have said repeatedly that the bulk of

the picketing has been lawful, and the union has made it clear that it is not in support of unlawful picketing violence or intimidation.
I come to the present position. I have explained the effect of the regulations and have made it clear that regulations of this kind are quite essential. I have talked about the law on picketing. I—

Mr. William Molloy: Before the Home Secretary leaves the law on picketing, will he give the House his opinion on those who intimidate people who are carrying out peaceful picketing, in the course of which some miners have been slain?

Mr. Maudling: All intimidation, from any quarter, is unlawful.

Mr. Orbach: Then why have not some of them been arrested?

Mr. Maudling: It is for the police to enforce the law. If any hon. Member thinks that the police on a certain occasion have not done what they should have. I hope he will let me have details.

Mr. Laurie Pavitt: The right hon. Gentleman will know that I have tried to put down a Private Notice Question to him asking about five pickets—five out of a total of eight—who were arrested in my area. Will he look into those cases, of which there are a number, where the police may have intervened when nothing really bad has occurred?

Mr. Maudling: Certainly I shall examine any suggestion put to me where things have been done badly. But I believe that in the face of a very difficult situation our police force has done a very good job.
Clearly, I cannot comment at the moment of the merits of the miners' claim. It would be wrong for me to comment now that the court of inquiry has been established. Indeed, if I were to comment hon. Members opposite would very soon accuse me of trying to prejudice the court of inquiry.
An offer has been made already to the miners' union. It has been told that its members can have that straight away if they return to work and that anything that the Wilberforce court of inquiry recommends subsequently will be accepted by the National Coal Board. I believe that there is very widespread


public opinion that the miners should return to work and cease their picketing on that basis.
I have little doubt that that is the view of people who are suffering from the shortage of electric power in many ways when coal is not being mined and, even more immediately, when coal which is available to the Generating Board cannot be moved by reason of picketing. In view of the fact that the existing offer can be taken immediately and that anything awarded by the court of inquiry will be available subsequently, the widespread public opinion is that, on that basis, the miners would be well advised to return to work and cease their picketing in the national interest.

Mr. Harold Wilson: Will the right hon. Gentleman explain why the Government took no action in relation to the industrial situation until he himself came to the House last Wednesday, by which time, on the Prime Minister's own estimates, many millions could have been thrown out of work? Will the right hon. Gentleman explain why there was no consultation with industry about it? Will he tell the House his own estimate of the number who will be thrown out of work this week, and will he undertake, for the benefit of the House and the country, to publish the figures which are collected every week of the number temporarily stopped? Figures of this kind have been available for many years. Will he publish them, so that we may know exactly how many people are signing on as temporarily stopped?

Mr. Maudling: Certainly figures are collected, and so far as they are relevant they will be published. If the right hon. Gentleman seriously asks me the reasons underlying the timing of the state of emergency, I can only assume that he did not listen to my speech.

Hon. Members: Shame.

4.5 p.m.

Mrs. Shirley Williams: I find it very difficult to believe that the Home Secretary has finished his speech. I looked round the House to see for whom the right hon. Gentleman was withdrawing, and I was amazed to discover that he was withdrawing for no one but the Government.
We on this side of the House want to make it clear that the right hon. Gentleman's calmness of manner in what he has said today totally belies the desperate situation that the country faces. I do not intend to follow up what was the right hon. Gentleman's clear bid to try to win the public over on the Government's side. I do not intend at the moment to follow up his detailed description of the regulations. They are familiar to us, and there will be an opportunity to debate them later. Instead, I propose to go into the reasons why the country faces a state of emergency.
It is clear that Britain faces the most serious industrial crisis since the war. It was described on 11th February by The Times as
. .a situation that is more dangerous than that of any other industrial dispute since the war.
We believe that the Government's obstinacy, incompetence and incredible complacency have done a great deal to create that emergency. It is an emergency which should never have happened. It is an emergency of the Government's own making. That is why we shall vote against the emergency regulations tonight.
I am sorry that it was not possible for me to make this speech before the House heard the Home Secretary. May I ask the Government exactly how this situation has arisen? May I ask why on 9th January the Minister for Industry said that there were at least eight weeks' stocks of coal supplies and that these would be adequate to continue for two months, depending upon normal winter weather? We have not had normal winter weather. To that extent the Government have had the Almighty on their side. Even so, after a month we find ourselves with power cuts, creating unemployment for more than half the country.
May I ask the Government why as recently as 7th February, in answer to Questions in this House, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry referred to there being only
 … a possibility of cuts in power supplies ".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th February, 1972; Vol. 830, c. 973]
and why he gave an almost entirely complacent picture of the situation facing the country?
Why have the Government failed to consult the Confederation of British


Industry, the Association of British Chambers of Commerce and the T.U.C. on the measures now being taken—or did they consult them, in which case we should have liked details from the Home Secretary? We have not had them.
Why did the Secretary of State for Employment not intervene at a very much earlier stage in an increasingly critical situation? Why even now does the Prime Minister maintain an almost total silence, leaving his colleagues to dispute amongst themselves who is responsible for the catastrophe that the country now faces? The Prime Minister reminds one rather of Lord Raglan at the Battle of Balaclava, who, I believe, lived in a ship in the harbour and advised the Light Brigade that it was
Their's not to reason why, their's but to do and die".
We on this side of the House indict the Government on four counts. The first is that they have hopelessly miscalculated the determination of the miners. Perhaps they believed that the miners' resolution would crumble after a couple of weeks. Perhaps they believed that the 41 per cent. of miners who did not support the strike would trickle back to work. But miners are not made in that way. This is an industry which is marked by loyalty and solidarity above any other. It is an industry which feels very deeply. I commend this seriously to right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite, because we are not anxious to see this dispute continue, to the suffering of a large part of the community.
It is high time that right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite recognised the massive contribution towards modernisation, productivity and pit closures that the National Union of Mineworkers has made over the past decade. Fifteen years ago there were 700,000 men employed in the pits. Today there are 280,000. Over that whole period of massive rundown there has not been a single official strike by the National Union of Mineworkers.

Mr. F. A. Burden: The House knows that under the Labour Government 218,900 miners lost their jobs and there was not one solitary sound from miners' representatives on the other side of the House. We also know that during the whole of that time the miners' living standards actually declined. They had the biggest increase ever last year

under the Tories. However, during the time of the Labour Government there was not one murmur from miners' Members opposite.

Mrs. Williams: First, that statement about mineworkers is not correct. The hon. Gentleman will recall that the Labour Government brought in a very generous scheme of early pensions for miners. He is only making the point which I have made, that this is an industry which richly deserves public consideration.
Secondly, in miscalculating the solidarity of the miners the Government also miscalculated the degree of public support that they have been able to arouse. It was not a Labour newspaper but the Daily Express which three days ago said:
The miners have enjoyed almost unanimous public sympathy.
I do not believe that the Government will be able to undermine that public sympathy by their crude attempts.
Thirdly, the Government have failed to recognise how essential the rôle of coal still is. As the Home Secretary rightly said, nearly three-quarters of our power supply is still founded upon coal. Yet coal is made to feel that it is an unfashionable, untrendy sort of fuel. But oil prices are going up dramatically as a result of the last O.P.E.C. agreement. Natural gas still supplies only a tiny margin of industry's needs. As for nuclear power, many hon. Gentlemen are aware of the difficulty faced by nuclear reactors in recent years.
The second major count against the Government is that they have utterly failed to calculate the serious repercussions of the stoppage on the economy. For a month they have consistently played down the effects of the coal strike on the economy. The National Coal Board made, and then withdrew, an offer. We all know that no really improved offer was made until 9th February, three days before the crisis hit the country. We all know, too, that feelings were so inflamed then that an offer that the National Union of Mineworkers has said it would have accepted a few weeks ago was no longer acceptable. This owes a great deal to the Government's mishandling of the situation. We know that the N.U.M. does not want a long dispute, but it is being forced into a long dispute by the


way in which these negotiations have been conducted.

Mr. Raymond Gower: Is the hon. Lady aware that the General Secretary of the N.U.M. cast some doubt on that in a radio broadcast at lunchtime today? He said that that was the opinion of the president, but it was not necessarily his opinion.

Mr. Molloy: He did not say that.

Mrs. Williams: I did not hear the broadcast, but I base my remarks upon the comments made by the president only this morning. That seems a fair basis on which to make them.
It is very difficult to avoid the conclusion—a conclusion which I think is coming home to more and more hon. Members—that the reason why the National Coal Board took so long to make a better offer, a better offer which I stress would have been acceptable at an earlier date, was that that strings of the National Coal Board were being pulled by the Government.
It has been clear since the Chancellor's speech last November that the Government have been operating a tacit incomes policy in the public sector. But that policy calls for a norm of settlement of 7–8 per cent., or, as my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition said over the weekend, a norm of 7–8 per cent. minus 1 per cent. on each settlement which takes place. It is hardly surprising that this afternoon the Home Secretary went such a long way to confirm that interpretation of the National Coal Board's approach.
Our third count against the Government is that they have abdicated responsibility. Last month the Secretary of State for Employment said:
If we are asked to make a relative improvement in the miners' position, other people must be held back, relatively speaking. That is a matter of clear definition. Unless or until the Opposition, individual union leaders and the T.U.C. make it clear that they are prepared to co-ordinate the making of claims to bring about this state of affairs, it is an idle hope".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th January, 1972; Vol. 829, c. 341–2.]
But the Government have again shunted off their responsibility for the business of government on to other people.

Mr. Peter Rost: rose—

Mrs. Williams: It is not the business of the Trades Union Congress, it is not the business of the Opposition and it is not the business of individual union leaders to govern for the Government—not even for this Government. If the Secretary of State for Employment believes that the miners have a strong case—he indicated this last week—he should have the courage to act upon that belief.

Mr. Rost: On the question of abdicating responsibility, will the hon. Lady now tell the House whether she believes the miners should go back to work pending the inquiry?

Mrs. Williams: If the hon. Gentleman will contain himself, I shall be able to get to that part of my speech.
On the fourth count, the Government have failed to clarify the whole picketing question. I welcome what the Home Secretary said today. I also welcome the way that, consistently throughout the dispute, he has made very clear that it is the right of men on strike to engage in peaceful picketing. I welcome the right hon. Gentleman's remarks this afternoon—he has made them before—recognising that the N.U.M. has been throughout completely opposed to violence, and only this morning indicated that it does not want the support of those elements from outside who introduce violence into local picketing situations.
But the Home Secretary knows—he has said so—that the law of picketing is in some respects a little vague. It is not always very easy to interpret the situation locally. That is why I welcome, but regard as very late indeed, his circular to chief constables which was sent out last Friday giving advice on what steps they should take. This followed a visit by a miners' delegation and myself to see the right hon. Gentleman the previous day.
Also, the right hon. Gentleman's colleague, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, has allowed the situation at the Saltley Gas Works, Birmingham, to run on after a proposal for a constructive solution had been put forward by my right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy


Jenkins) and my hon. Friends the Members for Birmingham, Small Heath (Mr. Denis Howell) and Birmingham, Lady-wood (Mrs. Doris Fisher) in whose constituency the depot is. When that solution was put into action the heat went out of the situation immediately. In our opinion, it should have been done very much earlier.
On the whole question of the inflamed relations between the two sides, the N.U.M. has throughout the dispute indicated that it would support the passage of priority supplies to hospitals, to the old, to the sick and to the handicapped, and that its co-operation is still very much available for this purpose. But there has been a singular failure of communication. It seems astonishing—I repeat, astonishing—that Ministers in the appropriate Department have not consulted industry. I quote what the Association of British Chambers of Commerce said in its telegram at the end of last week:
all Chambers of Commerce deplore the lack of prior consultation about severe power cuts announced by you"—
the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry—
in the House today. Moreover, this inadequate notice limits the opportunity to plan, especially as cuts could be on intermittent days. This is an unnecessary additional handicap to production.
I find it amazing that throughout the entire dispute the President of the N.U.M. has never been invited to meet either the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry or the Minister for Industry who is directly responsible for the coal mines.
It is, we believe, essential that the dispute should now end and as soon as possible. My answer to the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East (Mr. Rost) is that it is not the business of the Opposition to tell the N.U.M. to get its men back, but it is our business—[Interruption.] I shall make my speech in my own way—to do all that we possibly can to speed up the settlement of this dispute. At the weekend my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition pointed out that it should be possible for the court of inquiry to report within three or four days, and we on this side of the House—and I am sure the Government, too—are extremely grateful to the whole group of people sitting on the court of inquiry for the action they are taking to speed up

their hearings. We shall, of course, also wish to see the quickest possible consultation by the N.U.M. of its members following the court of inquiry's findings.
It is for the miners' leaders, after the court of inquiry has reported, to put the settlement to their members—I am talking about the settlement made by the court of inquiry; they cannot put the settlement to their members before they know what it is going to be—either by a ballot or by consulting the branches. I should like to ask the Secretary of State for Employment whether there is anything in Section 65(5) of the Industrial Relations Act which would make consultation with the branches slower because, as I understand it, the normal rapid procedure, which is to have a show of hands, would not be possible under that Act.
Throughout this discussion—and I do not in any way criticise him for it—the Secretary of State for Employment has said that a settlement above the norm would lead to an increase in the price of coal. Equally consistently my right hon. Friend the Shadow Minister for Fuel and Power has pointed out that the coal mining industry is still paying interest charges of £33·6 million a year. I notice some hon. Gentlemen opposite shaking their heads. That is the official figure. In 1965 the Labour Government waived part of the debt of the National Coal Board, and it would be open to the Government to do so now and, therefore, mitigate any inflationary effects.
I do not want to dodge the argument about inflation. The double duty to which the Secretary of State for Employment referred is a double duty which falls upon any Government. It is a duty to bring about just wage settlements, but it is a duty, also, to try to reduce inflation, and my colleagues on this side of the House believe that the solution to this dilemma lies in the Government's own hand.
The Government cannot pursue a housing policy, a social services policy and a taxation policy which adds immeasurably to the burdens of the lower paid and then urge upon them restraint. At present there is passing through the House a Bill which will increase the rents of council house tenants by £1 a week. The Government cannot say to men whose rent is being increased by £1


a week that they should not make wage claims to cover that amount. [Interruption.] The Government cannot tell ordinary men and women to desist from making wage claims at a time when the Government are putting up the price of school meals, withdrawing school milk—[Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. These interruptions are interrupting the hon. Lady the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams).

Mrs. Williams: The Government cannot tell ordinary men and women not to make inflationary wage claims when they are increasing the price of school meals, withdrawing school milk, increasing social service charges and taking other actions which will put up their daily cost of living. Above all, we say to the Government that they cannot mobilise the country to fight inflation when they themselves have done so much to create it.
Mr. Campbell Adamson, the Director of the C.B.I., said at the end of last week:
This is a battle for the economic future of this country. That future can only be secured by a recognition of the needs of all sections of the community 
It is time that the Government abandoned their policies of social and industrial brinkmanship, for they have created the chaos in which they find themselves. We believe that the country can no longer be asked to pay so high a price for the obduracy of one man.

4.26 p.m.

Mr. Christopher Tugendhat: We have heard a great deal during this dispute about the cost of coal, and one of the most impressive features of the coal miners' case is the fact that they do a difficult and dangerous job which requires special treatment from the community. It is a case which, on the whole, has been widely and sympathetically received, and one in which I think most people would sec a good deal of validity.
But one of the difficulties which have faced this Government—and every previous Government—in dealing with special cases has been the amount which should be accorded to the special case in any given year. I think that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employ

ment was able to show last week that the Government have tried to do something for the miners and that the trend which was so apparent under the previous Government has to some extent been reversed. Many of us would like to see this trend still further reversed in future. but the problem is that it is not possible, at one time, to accord increases on the enormous scale which the miners have requested, and we are now faced not with the cost of coal but with the cost of the dispute.
We have a situation in which 280,000 men are, in effect, holding the country to ransom. It is not a case of criticising their past record. It is not a case of criticising the particular tactics which they may be adopting. It is a case of saying that here are 280.000 men who have been offered an increase which they can take now and which in no sense prejudices any further increases which they might get, but who are remaining on strike at immense cost to the country.

Mr. Fred Evans: Will the hon. Gentleman now explain why in the initial stages, when the position was negotiable, pressurising by his Government made the National Coal Board withdraw its offer instead of leaving it on the table? From then on things began to harden, and they have become so rock hard that the hon. Gentleman's argument is irrelevant.

Mr. Tugendhat: I hope the hon. Gentleman will agree that I have attempted not to take too controversial a view. There are two sides to any dispute. It is beyond doubt that the leaders of the N.U.M. have adopted an extremely obdurate attitude. There is room for more than one opinion about whether they would have accepted a settlement earlier on. Certainly they have not shown any willingness to conciliate. But that does not alter my point that 280.000 men are holding the country to ransom and that they do not lose anything by going back. The court of inquiry is not prejudiced if they do return to work and immense pain and suffering is being caused to the nation as a result of their refusal to take up the offer and await the result of the court of inquiry.
If the miners refuse to go back now, all reasonable people will wonder whether two questions do not arise. In the first


place it will be wondered whether the N.U.M. is not embarking on its own private war with the Government using the nation as a battleground. Secondly it will be wondered whether the union, its members and families care about the suffering and harm they are doing to the rest of the community. No one doubts that they have a case or that they are a special case, but this does not excuse them forcing the country into the position it is now in when they can go back and take the increase and when nothing is prejudiced in the court of inquiry.

Mr. Bob Brown (Newcastle-upon-Tyne, West): The hon. Gentleman has said that no one doubts that the miners have a case. How, then, does he account for the fact that his Government allowed the Coal Board to withdraw its niggardly offer?

Mr. Tugendhat: I said that no one doubts that the N.U.M. has a special case. The negotiations were at all times based on the assumption that the miners would receive a substantial increase; the argument was on "how substantial". It does not seem really relevant to the argument as to whether the miners have a special case to discuss the manner in which the head of the Coal Board and the head of the union negotiate. I am trying to talk about the broad case of the mineworkers in the community, not about the progress of the negotiations.

Mr. Brown: The Government did not accept that the miners had a case.

Mr. Tugendhat: Everyone accepts that they had a special case. If they had not, the argument would have been not about the size of the increase but about whether there should be an increase at all.
I turn now to the position of the Government. A great deal of laughter goes up on the Labour Benches when it is said from this side that the Government have achieved much success in their fight against inflation. The figures are irrefutable. In the two years before the end of last year prices were rising at an accelerating rate. They are certainly still rising too fast, but the rate of increase of inflation has dropped by nearly half. This is something which is in the interests of us all, something as much in the interests of the miners as anyone else.
I was much encouraged by the speech made by the right hon. Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. Harold Lever) during the coal debate last Tuesday when he said explicitly that he hoped—and he spoke for the Opposition although not for the union movement—

Mr. Dennis Skinner: Not for the Labour Party.

Mr. Tugendhat: There are, I know, some differences within the Labour Party. The right hon. Gentleman said that other unions would not take as a precedent any special treatment according to the N.U.M. Many of us would certainly agree with the hon. Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams) that one of the weaknesses in the system of wage bargaining—it has been with us under all Governments for many years—is that each cash settlement granted to one union is used as a precedent by the next union regardless of the circumstances in which the settlement was made.
This has had two serious disadvantages for the country. In the first place it has led to much more rapid inflation than would otherwise have been the case since each special case has not been regarded as such but rather has been regarded as a justification for already highly-paid unions to take more. The second disadvantage has been that it has led to social injustice. Instead of the special circumstances of individual low-paid groups of people doing unpleasant difficult and dangerous jobs being accorded the special treatment they deserve, they have received the same percentage increases as or frequently lower increases than other more favoured groups with the result that on the whole the rich have got richer and the poor have got poorer. The car workers in the Midlands have managed to increase their wages by a much greater rate than the coalminers, while people who are not in trade unions at all—there are many millions—have been left behind.
If we are to break out of this spiral it is necessary to try to find some system of wage negotiation, bargaining and settlement which takes account of these social criteria as well as the economic criteria which have dominated the thinking of all Governments since the war. When the hon. Lady says it is not the duty of the trade union movement or of


the Opposition to do the Government's work she is right, but the right hon. Member for Cheetham put his finger on the point when he said that if the miners are to be regarded as a special case, if they are to receive the treatment they deserve—

Mrs. Renée Short: They do not want to be regarded as a special case.

Mr. Tugendhat: I think that they are a special case, and so does the right hon. Member for Barnsley (Mr. Mason), and he said so in an eloquent speech last Tuesday. Most people think that. If they are to receive this sort of treatment it is essentially important that the trade union movement should recognise the special cases when they exist and should not take them as a precedent to govern wage negotiations as a whole.
There is one area in which I hope the miners will set a precedent. I hope they will set a precedent which will enable this Government now and in future to be able to support wage settlements, and to introduce settlements tailored to the special circumstances of special industries and not based on straightforward percentage terms across the board which can be applied with equal force to everyone every time. Our thinking has been dominated by economic criteria. This has been essential. We have faced catastrophic inflation which has done immense harm to everyone. But if we are to have a lasting system of economic stability in which wages do not outrun productivity it is vitally important that we should be able to introduce social as well as economic criteria into our system of wage bargaining. If this terrible dispute enables us to set the foundations of that it will also enable us to do something which has eluded all Governments since the war, and in that sense it will be a great step forward.
it is not the right way to begin if 280,000 men hold the country to ransom—when they can go back and lose nothing—and millions of people all over the country lose an immense amount. This is the essential feature, and it is on this point that the miners can really help the nation to get off to a new start.

Mr. John E. B. Hill: My hon. Friend mentions the figure of

280,000 men. If as we are told 41 per cent. were against the strike, it reduces the figure to 168,000, which is no more than three large football match attendances. That is the measure of those who are holding the nation to ransom.

Mr. Tugendhat: I do not want to go into precise numbers. The principle that small groups of people should not misuse their power was what I was getting at.

Mr. Denis Howell: That is what the City has been doing—

Mr. Tugendhat: I was giving way to the hon. Member for Swindon (Mr. David Stoddart).

Mr. David Stoddart: I have been trying to get in for a long time. Would the hon. Gentleman not agree that the language he has been using during his speech has been very inflamatory? Would he not further agree that talking about holding the country to ransom will not help anyone and will certainly not encourage the miners to go back to work? It seems that the hon. Gentleman has been arguing for an incomes policy, which is denied by the Prime Minister. Is the hon. Gentleman in dispute with his right hon. Friend? All the way this Government have been arguing for competition and for people to charge what the market will bear. The market will at present bear a very heavy price for coal, and the miners are, therefore, in an extremely strong position. The hon. Gentleman is advocating that they should leave that position—

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. E. L. Mallalieu): Order. The hon. Gentleman rose to make an intervention but is making a speech.

Mr. Tugendhat: I was thinking that the hon. Gentleman's intervention was almost as long as my speech.
That the miners are in a very strong position nobody doubts. The question is whether anybody has the right to abuse his position, especially when it is a strong one. My speech has not been meant to be inflamatory, and it has been far from inflamatory—[Interruption.]
I have conceded that the miners have a special case and should receive special consideration. We also need a system of settling wages and bargaining in such a


way that it takes account of the various criteria to which I have referred. At this moment, while it seems that no hon. Gentleman opposite is anxious to intervene in my speech, I take the opportunity of silence and sit down.

4.41 p.m.

Mr. Michael Stewart: The immediate occasion of this debate is the question whether it is right, as the Government think, to introduce a state of emergency.
In trying to justify that to us, the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary laid great stress on what he regarded as the unexpected success of picketing. I remember well—any member of the public who has followed the matter will remember—that before the dispute began the leaders of the trade union movement made it clear that, whatever they might or might not be able to do to help the miners, they would certainly advise their members not to cross the picket lines.
Anyone who can understand plain English should have realised from that two things. The first was that there would soon be created a considerable power crisis. The second was that there was the most massive sympathy and support for the miners among the general body of working people.

Mr. David Mitchell: Is the right hon. Gentleman arguing that for that reason the House should tonight not grant the powers for which the Government are asking? Does he intend to support his hon. Friends in voting against these powers being given to the Government?

Mr. Stewart: I thought that that trick question would be asked and that hon. Gentlemen opposite would ask whether we approved of a state of emergency being introduced. My reply is the same as that given in a slightly different context by the present Lord Chancellor, who said, in effect, "If a man throws himself off a cliff and bounces from one crag to another, it is idle to ask whether one approves or disapproves of his bouncing. He should not have thrown himself off in the first place." Hon. Gentlemen opposite must get this straight in their heads.
It is interesting to note the passionate desire of hon. Gentlemen opposite to pro

nounce on this topic during speeches made by my hon. Friends. Some of my hon. Friends have gone down and stood with the picket lines. In view of the flood of eloquence from the benches opposite, I am expecting hon. Gentlemen opposite—accompanied by the massive numbers of members of the general public whom they always say are on their side—shortly to go down and orate to the pickets, showing them what splendid things the Conservatives have done for the miners and demonstrating the wrongs of holding the nation to ransom, as hon. Gentlemen opposite put it. I can see the picket lines melting away in shame under the oratory of hon. Gentlemen opposite.
The real question we are debating is the profound and general one of what principles should govern the sharing in this country of the wealth that is produced by the joint effort of all who work by hand or brain. It is the argument about that that has produced this situation.
My belief has always been that any Government, whether or not they like it, will end up by having an incomes policy. There is in one of Moliere's plays a character who is astounded to learn that he has been talking prose all his life. The Government must in the end have an incomes policy—again, I mean any Government—just as we must talk prose and a Government who begin by saying that they will not have an incomes policy end up by having an unjust and bad one. That is what is happening to this Government, for three principles have governed their approach to the matter.
The first principle is their belief that in the main one should have a policy which will chiefly help those who are already well off. That, as was demonstrated in a brilliant article in The Times not long ago by one of my hon. Friends and in other sources, has been the main effect of the Government's policy over tax relief. Their aim has been to give substantial help to those who are already well off.
It is true that this has been decked out with a few showy pieces of selective social services support. I do not know how many hon. Gentlemen opposite and members of the Government read the Labour Weekly. I commend it to them, even if they must read it by candlelight.
The latest issue points out that owing to the operation of rent rebates, family income supplement, this that and the other, if the miners were to accept here and now all that is available to them a considerable number of them who are the least well paid would be worse off.

Mr. Fred Evans: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the N.U.M. in the South Wales area has estimated that 80,000 miners could, if their pride did not prevent them from doing so, qualify for family income supplement?

Mr. Stewart: That does not surprise me, and it illustrates that this Government's policy, despite their attempt to deck it out with income supplements and the rest, in the main has been a policy to increase the inequality of the distribution of wealth.
The justification from their point of view is that it enables the people in charge to make higher profits, and that this is the great incentive. They claim that because of the greater incentive all will work harder and we shall all be better off. This is the doctrine which, off and on, the Tory Party and employers have preached for the last 100 years, and it has never worked because the attempt to make it work has created justified resentment among poorer sections of the community.
The second principle of the Government's incomes policy has been to discriminate against public servants because they have not been able to bash other groups of workers. Hon. Gentlemen opposite ask whether any of my hon. Friends are prepared to tell the miners to go back to work now. What they are really asking is whether we are prepared to underwrite and approve an incomes policy of this kind, and the answer is "No. Most certainly not." Neither is the public at large prepared to accept it, as public reaction has recently demonstrated.
Much of what has been said by hon. Gentlemen opposite has been a last-minute attempt to try to shunt public opinion against the miners. That is the point of phrases like "Holding the nation to ransom" and "The battle against inflation".
What are the figures in this battle against inflation? Roughly speaking, in

the first 12 months after the Tories came to power they managed to produce a rate of rise in prices about twice that which occurred in the previous 12 months under Labour. I admit that since then the rise has not been as much as twice as great, but to call it a victory in the battle against inflation is the kind of military calculation that could only have occurred to Lord Raglan, to whom my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams) referred.
I believe that the British command in the Crimean War was partly hampered by the fact that the commander-in-chief forgot that he was fighting the Crimean War against the Russians and thought he was engaged in a war against the French, who were, in fact, his allies. That is the trouble with some of the more innocent hon. Gentlemen opposite, who really believe that they are engaged in a battle against inflation when, bluntly, they are engaged in a battle against those of their fellow citizens who are not so well off and particularly against those who happen to be employed in the public service.
The third principle of the Government's incomes policy, if we can call it an incomes policy, is that of "Stand on your own feet", even if it involves, as it so often does, standing on a great many people's corns as well; or, putting it bluntly, it is the principle of "To each what he can grab". The hon. Member for the Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Tugendhat) talked of the miners waging a private war against the nation. For the reasons I have given, I believe that charge to be wholly unjustified—

Mr. Tugendhat: I did not say that the miners were doing that but that if they failed to go back this question would arise, because they could go back without loss to themselves.

Mr. Stewart: That is to say that the hon. Member does not think it right to use that piece of abuse yet. It will be turned on perhaps next week if it is considered necessary.
But even if the charge were true, even if the miners were waging a private war against the nation, on the basis of Conservative philosophy why should they not do so when business men say. "Unless our taxes are reduced, unless our profits are increased, we cannot be expected to


undertake the organising of the nation's exports"? One could just as well call that holding the nation to ransom or waging in a war against the nation.
The trouble is that Conservative hon. Members and many publicists have never tried to hold the scales even between people who earn their living, getting wages and salaries, and people—generally better-off people—who get their incomes from interest and profit. It is always generally assumed that if there is a dispute between those two groups and the nation is suffering it is especially up to the employee to put the nation's interests before his own pocket rather than that at least the same obligation rests on the employer—who, by the way, in this case is the nation at large, and it is very far from clear that the nation at large is demanding that the miners should immediately go back to work. A good many people are first awaiting the Wilberforce report, and privately thinking that Lord Wilberforce should have been appointed a good deal earlier, and that if the whole thing had not been mishandled we should not be in this present situation at all.
Yet people who get wages and salaries, particularly in the more laborious occupations, do understand. It was spelt out for us 50 years ago—in 1921, when there was a great mining dispute. Apropos that dispute, there was written a book which immediately dealt with the rights and wrongs of the dispute but contained also a profound study of the nature of the kind of society in which we live. I refer to Professor R. H. Tawney's "The Acquisitive Society", which from that day to this goes on selling and which it would be well worth the while of anybody to read. Professor Tawney spells out that if we live in a society where we are constantly reminded of private enterprise and told "Stand on your own feet" and "Look after for yourself", the Nemesis of such a society is that we gradually rot away all the ordinary loyalties towards one another that one hopes human beings would have and which tend to unite society.
It is that element which is lacking. We now face what Tawney called the Nemesis of the acquisitive society, and nothing less than a really radical change in heart and philosophy will get us out of the situation. Whatever the result

of this present dispute, the problem will recur for one group of workers after another as long as our society is based on the uncivilised philosophy with which we now try to make it work.
In practical terms, I believe that the Government ought to have, if not necessarily for publication, a private guide line in their own mind something like the following. They should say that for the present there is to be an upper income level, and that no one above that level can expect public policy to be arranged in a manner which will put anything more into his pocket until some of the worst injustices have been remedied and until there is a more equal distribution of wealth among those who carry the heavy end of the stick in society.
Much has been spoken of the nature of a miner's work. It is not only the miner who has to do dangerous and difficult work, but I believe that one element in an incomes policy is that the people who write about it are too often inclined to forget the nature of the work. The reason is that writing for the newspapers and the weekend magazines is an intellectual and not a manual occupation, and an intellectual occupation involves hard work. I trust that all of us here can say that we work hard, but we do not have the kind of work which means that every day one runs the risk of anything from a broken finger to a broken back.
A large number of our fellow countrymen do that kind of work. We do not return from work, nor do the editors of newspapers and those who draw cartoons unfriendly to miners do the kind of work, that leaves a man at the end of the day dirty right through the skin, bruised, scratched and physically exhausted in a way that many kinds of work do not exhaust a man. If we are to have the kind of society in which we can appeal to human beings: "Don't wage war on the nation. Think of the public interest", this is the kind of thing we must think of more than we have ever thought before.
It is because there is not the slightest hope of getting such a change of heart or thought out of the Government that all of us on this side will vote against them with great enthusiasm tonight.

4.58 p.m.

Mr. Cecil Parkinson: I have listened with great interest to the


remarks of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Fulham (Mr. Michael Stewart). The nation had the chance at the General Election in 1970 to have its say about the sort of society it wanted, and it is true to say that the right hon. Gentleman and his right hon. Friends had their chance over a period of six years. They tried a statutory incomes policy and many other manoeuvres. Many of us on this side and many people in the country believe that a great many of our problems stem from the fact that people when in office with those half-baked ideas gambled with and wasted the nation's time and energy.
The hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne, West (Mr. Bob Brown) talked in terms, very common among Labour supporters now, of the Coal Board's niggardly offer. Even after the largest ever cash increase in pensions last September, the offer made by the Coal Board was still 50 per cent. of the pension, and the increase being demanded by the National Union of Mineworkers is more than the old age pension. If the hon. Member describes those figures as niggardly, I can only suggest that instead of organising rallies for old pensioners to complain about inflation he does his bit by telling the National Union of Mineworkers that it is demanding more in increase than the old age pensioners now get as a pension.
Listening to the last two debates on the coal industry, one has been more and more driven to the conclusion that a lot of very phoney figures and statistics have been bandied about. Because I have no desire to take part in perpetrating an injustice against the miners, I read for two days last week a document that not many hon. Members have read—the last report and accounts of the National Coal Board for 1970–71. I extracted some figures which I must say came as a great surprise to me. I have listened to the very moving speeches from the Opposition benches about men taking home £13 per week. I have no need to be persuaded of the dangers inherent in mining. Because he was too old to serve in the Armed Forces during the war, my father volunteered to be a Bevin Boy. I make no secret of the fact that it nearly killed him. He described to me very graphically the condi

tions under which he was forced to work. I have immense sympathy for those who work in the industry.
But, from the Coal Board's accounts last year, instead of £13 per week we find that the average wage was £27·05, and the average allowance was £1·85. The average figure was about £29 per week. That is not a great figure, but it is a great increase on the £13 figure bandied about when people have been seeking to wring the hearts of others. One had the impression that the Coal Board was exploiting the miners. But to my immense horror I find that the Coal Board makes four new pence profit per ton of coal mined. The difference between the cost to the Coal Board of obtaining coal and what the Board sells it for at the pithead is 4p. Again, I was quite impressed by the statement that a great profit is being made out of distributing coal, and that coal is being sold at £20 per ton. The impression given was that coal being sold at £20 had been bought for £5·84 and that there was a great profit tucked away for the distributors. But I looked at that matter and found that coal sold at £20 per ton leaves the pithead at very nearly £20 per ton.—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] The average is brought down because of the huge amounts, according to a letter in The Times today, of very cheap, low-grade coal supplied to electricity authorities and to industry. Again it was pointed out in the same letter today that 6,000 of those who were supposed to be making huge profits distributing coal have gone out of business during the last 10 years. The number of distributors has dropped from 15,000 to 9,000. The average profit to the Coal Board per man shift is 8·8 new pence. That is the amount that the Coal Board has in hand after paying its costs per man shift.
Those figures drive hom a fact which cannot be denied, that if any profit is being made out of coal—one doubts whether much profit is being made—the Coal Board is not making it. At present it is selling coal for almost as much as it can get for it without any increase in price, which would be counter productive and would mean cutting back on demand for the fuel, yet at present it is making only 8·8 new pence per man shift.
I do not say this because I wish to prove that the miners are lazy or that


the Coal Board is being bloody minded. Board is working on the finest possible margin. If hon. Members opposite back What it demonstrates is that the Coal a demand for an extra 100p per shift, which is effectively what the demand is, they should explain where the other 91p is coming from, because at present the Coal Board is making a profit of only 8·8p per manshift. Therefore, we may say, perhaps, that the Coal Board should increase its price. But at present we know that the Coal Board is able to sell only because its main customer, the C.E.G.B., is forced to buy.
I remind hon. Members opposite who seek to ignore this point when they talk about the power of the miners. It is true that miners have immense power. They have it because we have insisted that another State monopoly, the Central Electricity Generating Board must take 75 per cent. of its needs from the State monopoly in coal. We have given the miners the power that hon. Members opposite boast about them having because we have insisted that the C.E.G.B. takes 75 per cent. of its requirements from the pits. Having given that power, we can also take it away.
The main conclusion inevitably to be drawn is that we can no longer allow this situation to continue. No Government will ever be forgiven by the public if they say to the public, should another incident of this kind occur, "Having learned a lesson, we did nothing. We still allowed that industry, which has shown that it can take the country by the throat, to have the country by the throat."
A priority decision for my right hon. Friend must he to lower the 75 per cent. of its needs which the C.E.G.B. is required to take in coal. We can never again allow a State monopoly to supply 75 per cent. of the needs of another State monopoly. The C.E.G.B. must be allowed to convert more of its stations to oil, and there must be a more balanced intake of fuels to meet its requirements.
In conclusion, I have listened often to the suggestion, put very charmingly by the right hon. Gentleman for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. Harold Lever), that a little bookkeeping operation could sort out the whole thing and that a few figures could be written off the balance sheet and the whole thing would come right. I looked

again at the question of interest charges on the Coal Board, because the only constructive suggestion about finding the money to meet the claim we have had from hon. Members opposite is that we should write down the Coal Board's capital. It came as a surprise to me that £415 million was written off less than seven years ago. We were told then that a margin of about £50 million had been built into that figure to take account of the fact that there may have to be further closures and that another £43·2 million has been paid in grants since 1965. Not a penny of the original compensation for the mineowners is outstanding. The whole of these loans represents investment since the nationalisation in the coal industry. £220 million represents advances since 1965.
We repeatedly hear about restructuring the industry. The truth is that the industry is making a bad return on the capital employed. But that capital has been advanced comparatively recently and has been poured into modernising the mines.
Even if we wrote off the whole of the interest charges, 13 out of 18 areas of the Coal Board would still lose £17 million. It is not good enough to pretend that a small bookkeeping operation, making some alterations in the balance sheet or playing about with the figures, would achieve anything. The only way that the Coal Board can become viable is by charging more. If it does, it will lose a considerable proportion of its customers. If it loses customers, it will have to cut back its operations. Hon. Members opposite must face this fact. As The Economist said last week, large increases in the price of coal would probably mean a cutback of 80,000 to 90,000 miners. Listening to the earlier debates was like taking part in a phoney war. Unrealistic figures were bandied around, and the impression was given that some smart little bookkeeping trick could sort out the whole thing. Let hon. Members opposite tell their supporters the truth.

Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Tell your supporters the truth.

Mr. Parkinson: If they want to have a high wage industry, they will have to accept it as a much smaller industry than it is at present. If hon. Members


opposite are prepared to follow through their arguments and back their beliefs that the miners should be paid more, we have the right to expect them to say where the money is coming from. It is time that they stopped pretending that some cheap little bookkeeping device is the answer. It is not the answer. The answer will be higher prices, fewer customers and a smaller industry.

5.9 p.m.

Mr. William Whitlock: Like my right hon. Friend the Member for Fulham (Mr. Michael Stewart), I was led into a train of thought when listening to the speech of the hon. Member for the Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Tugendhat), who talked about the miners holding the country to ransom. I could not help thinking about the largesse—hundreds of millions of pounds—handed out by this Government in tax concessions to the better-off who the Government thought were in need of that kind of incentive if they were to do their bit by the country and invest in industry. The Government paid the mass of the people the compliment of thinking that they would not need such an incentive to do their bit for the country. The Government realised that the mass of the people would carry on even if they were made worse off.
What has been the result of the handing out of largesse to the better-off? It has been swallowed up. It has not been invested in industry. The people who had that reward are still "on strike"; they have not shown confidence in the Government. The miners, who have not yet had that incentive from the Government, are on strike.
If the hon. Member for Enfield, West (Mr. Parkinson), who has been looking at the Coal Board's accounts, will look at them again he will see that a fraction of the money given away in largesse would, if made available to the Coal Board, solve the Board's problems and enable the miners to receive a decent wage.
It has been suggested that the coal dispute is a political strike. That is exactly what it is. It is a political strike because the Government made it so. The Government made it so in their

determination at the outset to defeat the miners, to meddle in the wage negotiations, and to use the defeat of the miners to further their own unfair and undefined incomes policy.
There are a number of disturbing aspects of the Government's handling of the affair which need answers. For a long time every story told by the mass media about the strike showed signs of Whitehall briefing, hinting at the prospects of an unsuccessful strike because of the allegedly high level of distributed coal stocks.
Now, suddenly, surprisingly and suspiciously, there is a different story, and a national catastrophe is just around the corner. What is the explanation of all this? The Guardian, in its miscellany column of Saturday, 12th February, said this:
Three possible explanations—the Central Electricity Generating Board somehow got its sums wrong; or, for some unknown reason, coal stocks have dwindled at several times the expected rate; or John Davies was panic-mongering, to win the support of the great British public against the miners' pickets. Take your pick.
Strange things are going on. During the weekend I learned of something which certainly needs explanation in the House. The Ratcliffe Power Station near Nottingham is a base load station aiming at 100 per cent. availability and supplying 6 per cent. of the national grid supply. Normally it has four 500-megawatt generators in operation, so that its full output is 2,000 megawatts. About three weeks ago there was a rumour that two sets—that is, two generators capable of supplying three cities the size of Nottingham at peak load—were to be taken out of service for survey. Generators are not normally taken out of service until the summer, when the demand is low. Therefore, this rumour seemed to indicate a mighty peculiar situation.
Eleven days ago the two sets were in fact taken out of commission, at a time when one of the other generators was out of service because of a fault, leaving, therefore, only one of the four generators in service. So three weeks ago the decision was taken, at national level, to reduce that station to one-quarter of its normal capacity. Who took that decision, and why? And in how many other cases over the country has something similar happened?
What has happened at Ratcliffe, if repeated elsewhere, makes sense only it the decision were taken three or four weeks ago that, whatever happened in the miners' strike, whether it ended quickly or not, there would be power cuts, and the anger of the public would be directed at the miners; and the Government would have won a psychological victory in their efforts to keep down wages while their policies deliberately forced up prices.
Machiavellian though all that sounds, it is no more so than when the Prime Minister decided to demonstrate his virility by having a number of exemplary bankruptcies, notably that of Rolls-Royce. Then, as now, the Government blindly and arrogantly went ahead with their pigheaded plans until, finding that lame ducks come home to roost, they belatedly came to the realisation that to allow Rolls-Royce and other concerns to go down the drain would greatly increase unemployment, cause the collapes of a number of communities and damage Britain's good name as a trading nation in the world.
Now, once again, after so-called determined and abrasive government, we have panic measures and a dawning realisation of the consequences of pursuing the policies which the Government seem to have set for themselves. Now at Radcliffe, at the power station I have mentioned, people are working like mad to bring back into service, at reduced loads, the two generators which were taken out of service eleven days ago. That calls for an explanation from the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry.
The feature of the debate on 18th January seemed to be that there was agreement on all sides that the miners are not mindless militants but are responsible people who have co-operated to the full in the contraction of their industry and in the introduction of measures which pushed up productivity in the past. Those were the halcyon days when hon. Members opposite could even afford to be complimentary to the miners because they thought then that the miners would capitulate very early. Since then, their attitude has changed because the miners, contrary to the expectations of hon. Gentlemen opposite, have shown their solidarity and their determination to pursue their strike to a just end.
In those years of co-operation by the miners, the miners have seen how inaccurate were the experts who predicted how quickly nuclear-generated power would become cheaper than electricity from coal-fired power stations. They have seen long periods when the price of coal at the pithead has remained stable while the retail price of coal has gone steadily upwards; because between the pithead and the fireplace there has been a multiplicity of factors, agents and middlemen, many of whom serve no useful purpose to the community.
The miners' sacrifice and co-operation have brought them, not an improved standard of living by comparison with the rest of us, but a lowered standard of living. That is why, faced with the Government's meddling in the wage negotiations, the miners are bitter, and the nation is placed in this present disastrous situation because the Government did not understand a number of things. They did not understand that that bitterness existed. They did not understand how they would further exacerbate that bitterness by their interference in wages matters. Most important of all, they did not understand miners.
On 18th January my hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield (Mr. Concannon) spoke very eloquently and movingly about Nottinghamshire miners. I am proud to say that I represent many of them in this House. I have a very high regard, admiration and affection for them. I count many of them as my personal friends, and over the years that I have been here I have tried to ensure that I have understood some of their problems. I have gone down into the pits on 10 occasions; altogether I have been into eight pits. I have taken my wife and children underground in order that they may know the conditions in which miners have to work.
Some time ago I took a number of naval officers down a pit in my constituency, and when they were leaving they expressed amazement at what they had seen. They had become aware for the first time that mining is still a dirty, arduous and dangerous job and that miners not only have to do dangerous physical work but are technicians, too. In view of the wonderful spirit which existed between the men in the pit and


the management, they referred to that mine as a happy ship.
The industry is no longer a happy ship, although all the qualities which were admired so much by those naval officers are still there, ready and available to the nation when the Government make up their mind that they will give the miners a better deal. If the Government have counted upon the capitulation of the miners, as they obviously have, they could not possibly have understood those qualities. This industry produces men who are responsible, loyal, friendly and kindly, and anyone who has ever had contact with the mining community must have found the community very friendly and warm-hearted.
The men who work in the bowels of the earth to win for the rest of us the petrified sunshine of a bygone age, and the families who have to live in the shadow of the pit and in the shadow of all that it can do to them, are not, in spite of their experiences, clannish, even though their lives and livelihoods might in many ways make them a race apart.
The men who daily risk injury and death also face the insidious build-up inside them of the consequences of breathing coal dust. Not only do they contract those terrible diseases like pneumoconiosis, but respiratory diseases such as emphysema and bronchitis are much more prevalent amongst miners than among any other section of the community.
The Registrar-General's decennial supplement on occupational mortality showed in 1964 that mortality from bronchitis among miners under 65 was 35 per cent. higher than in the general male population of the same age. Astonishingly, for miners' wives, the figure was 75 per cent. What is the explanation of that amazingly high fatal incidence of bronchitis amongst miners' wives? Perhaps it is the consequence of past generations of miners' families living on low wages and in poor housing conditions, and the necessity for the women of those past generations to breathe 24 hours a day noxious fumes from burning colliery tips.
I do not know the cause of this high incidence of respiratory disease amongst miners and their families, but, whatever

the cause, it means that mining families have bred in them by bitter experience a solidarity and sympathy with their menfolk. The Government have not understood this. They have looked for cracks in the miners' ranks. They thought that they could easily starve them into submission in this first official mining strike for 46 years. They have hopelessly misjudged the situation. Let them, therefore, now come down from the ivory tower from which they have directed their unfair and undefined incomes policy and let them enable the Coal Board to meet the miners with their legitimate grievances.
Reference has been made to the fact that my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. Harold Lever) suggested on 18th January that the financial structure of the industry should be reviewed. I hope that the Government have come to their senses, that they will permit the Coal Board to give the miners a fair deal and that they will definitely institute the review for which my right hon. Friend called. We badly need coal. We badly need miners. This is the lesson of this strike. We shall need them for a long time to come. Let the Government go into action to ensure that all the hardships that we are about to experience are rapidly brought to an end by making that coal available and gettng the miners hack to work at the earliest possible moment.

5.26 p.m.

Mr. William Shelton: I have listened with great interest to the debate today, as I did to the previous coal mining debate. I listened with especial interest to the right hon. Member for Fulham (Mr. Michael Stewart), for whom I have always had a great regard, and to the hon. Member for Nottingham. North (Mr. Whitlock) about the life of the coal miner, and I accept what he says. It is an unpleasant life. It has been underpaid, and it is dangerous. There are other occupations which have the same hazards, but which are perhaps not so unpleasant. Before the war coalmining suffered grievous unemployment and even greater hardship.
I have never intervened in a mining debate before. I am not a miner. I have never been down a mine in this


country. The same applies to my constituents. I doubt whether there is a single miner in my constituency. For the first time since I have had the privilege of representing them in this House my constituents have become grievously affected by the consequences of a miners' strike, and it is my duty to represent their interests here and to give weight to their opinions.
In the last few days, like all hon. Members, I have been in my constituency talking to people trying to discover how they have been affected. I have received a great deal of mail and many telephone calls—an unusual number, in fact. I must tell the House that the view in my constituency does not seem to be that which prevails in many other parts of the country. Indeed, I would make so bold as to read one of the many letters which I received this morning and which I assure the House is typical:
Dear Sir, why is it that we hear on the wireless that the people are supposed to be for the miners.… What about the rest of the real working class who can only get a pound or two extra a week while the miners expect £8 or more, and our sympathy as well, while they as good as tell the rest of us to go to hell, and put up with the cost of living …
That seems to be a typical view in my constituency. There are many poor people among my constituents. The average age is slightly higher than that of the rest of the country, and at this moment I expect many of them are sitting in the dark without any form of heating. Some of them are old and Door, and some may well be sick, while others have small children. They are sitting in the dark and in the cold, not of their own choice. My constituents, and others like them, seem especially anxious and distressed about two factors in the present situation. First, like the great mass of people in this country, thank heavens, they are law-abiding people and—

Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Here we go.

Mr. Shelton: Indeed, "here we go". They fear and detest any sort of violence, whether it is offered or threatened in this House or elsewhere, as in Ireland. They have a revulsion against it, they fear it—and rightly they fear it, as all right hon. and hon. Members on both sides will agree.

Mr. Skinner: What is that?

Mr. Shelton: A revulsion against violence in any form. They believe, perhaps wrongly, that the miners—or certainly those from outside who have joined the ranks of the miners' pickets—have gone beyond peaceful picketing into intimidation. They believe this because they have seen it on the television screen, when their television sets have been working. This is the way that people learn what is going on, from reading the newspapers and watching the television. They may well be wrong, but that is what they believe. People believe that, because of the intimidation, they have been left in the dark and the cold, and they have a revulsion against that intimidation which, I am sure, all hon. Members must share.

Mr. Leslie Huckfield: What does the hon. Gentleman say about the occasions when lorry drivers have been intimated by their employers, by employers who have told them that, if they do not get a load of coke, they will be sacked? What about that kind of intimidation?

Mr. Brynmor John: That is respectable.

Mr. Shelton: I detest and abhor any sort of intimidation, including that kind of intimidation, too. If the hon. Gentleman will listen to what I am saying, he will understand that I am putting the view of my constituents, and I am adding that all of us should rightly be frightened of any signs of violence or initimation growing up in this country. Ulster, part of the United Kingdom, is already in the grip of violence. Let us not have violence in Great Britain as well. If there is intimidation of lorry drivers by employers, I should be opposed to that, naturally, and I hope that all my right hon. and hon. Friends, as well as hon. Members opposite, would take the same view.

Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Let us hear about it, then.

Mr. Shelton: The sympathy of my constituents, if they are warm enough to have any sympathy left, is principally, I believe, for the police, who seem to be having a rotten time.
The second anxiety which my constituents have is about inflation. I have already said that I have in my constituency many old people, many poor


people, and many people with large families. Inflation may not turn the lights out in a dramatic way like a power cut can, but, by heavens, it can dim them over a period of time. If any hon. Members or people outside are not afraid of inflation or do not believe that people generally are, I can only say that they have not talked in the constituencies.

Mr. John McCann: Inflation was the only thing this Government did at a stroke.

Mr. Shelton: As we all know, the miners may well be a special case—my hon. Friend the Member for the Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Tugendhat) argued that they are, and I would go along with that—but we know also that if the inquiry awards them, or suggests that they should have, a pay settlement very much greater than that offered by the National Coal Board, that award will inevitably be used as a target for all those other bodies which will be negotiating their pay settlements in the coming months, and inevitably it will mean an increase in the rate of inflation. There is no question of that.

Mr. John: Is the hon. Gentleman now arguing the case for not giving the miners the award which the inquiry makes, because it will provide a platform?

Mr. Shelton: I am saying that, if they receive a very much greater award, this will have a dramatic and dangerous inflationary effect in the country. I do not know what the award will be—we must wait for the result of the inquiry—but I hope that it will be reasonable. I understand that the Government have already said that they will accept the award of the inquiry—

Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Even though it is inflationary?

Mr. Shelton: Even though it is, perhaps, inflationary, yes—although I hope that it will not be.
I ask the Government to keep in mind the interests of all those who are lower paid, who may or may not be members of trade unions, who do not demonstrate, who do not use intimidation, who do not use violence, and who are still the vast majority of the nation.

5.35 p.m.

Mr. Charles Pannell: I imagine that most hon. Members knew that there were no coal miners in the constituency of the hon. Member for Clapham (Mr. William Shelton), who has just given us, largely, the prejudice of suburbia, of people who do not know the miners.

Mr. William Shelton: rose—

Mr. Pannell: I have hardly spoken yet. The hon. Gentleman must wait. He had difficulty enough in getting his words out when he was on his feet, and now I am on my feet he is bursting forth.
I had not presumed to take part in any of our debates on the coal mining industry because so many of those who represent mining constituencies, and who have been miners themselves, thought that our debates would not be complete without the advocacy of every one of them. I have great sympathy with my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner), for example, who has probably been pregnant with an undelivered speech on the occasion of every debate up to now.

Mr. Skinner: I did deliver one.

Mr. Pannell: I am glad to hear it. I can speak with some experience, however, of the problems here involved because I have been a member of the trade union movement for 50 years. I have been on the picket line. I know what peaceful picketing is. I knew what it was in tougher days. Incidentally, I read the debate on the emergency powers in 1926. The Minister handling those powers was Joynson Hicks, who was called "stupidly honest"—which, I suppose, was a form of insult which fitted him pretty well.
I find that these disputes always take the same course. When the dispute really begins to bite, people turn round and insult the miners' leadership. We read yesterday, for example, a whole page in the Sunday Times arguing that the dispute would not have happened if it had not been for Joe Gormley and Lawrence Daly. But I have a pretty good memory, and I always tinge present arguments about justice with memory. My memory goes back to the Sankey Commission of 1919, when two of the


outstanding miners' advocates—[Laughter.] I do not know why the hon. Member for Clapham is laughing. He knew very little about the miners, so it might do him a little good to listen to what I have to say. In 1919, at the time of the Sankey Commission, the advocacy of Robert Smillie and Frank Hodges was so brilliant that it not only compelled the original Commission to declare in favour of nationalisation but it even brought its chairman, Lord Sankey, into the ranks of the Labour Party.
One has only to think of the great figures since then, Herbert Smith, Ernest Jones, Jim Bowman, A. J. Cook, Will Paynter—all of them in their time—[An HON. MEMBER: "All written down?"] Certainly, I have jotted them down. I doubt that any hon. Member opposite knew about even one of them, so it is reasonable that I should list them and give the names.

Dame Irene Ward: I knew them.

Mr. Pannell: I have known these people. They have all been attacked in their day.

Dame Irene Ward: rose—

Mr. Pannell: No. The hon. Lady will not add anything to this debate. This is a serious matter.

Dame Irene Ward: I fought Bob Smillie.

Mr. Pannell: The point about the miners' dispute is that they knew from the start what they wanted. They started on their claim almost as soon as their last one had been settled nearly a year ago. They could not get the vote they wanted under their union rules, so they altered the rules and got a ballot vote in favour of the strike. [An HON. MEMBER: "Only just."] When Iain Macleod was Minister of Labour he was never very much in favour of having ballot votes to bring workers out on strike, because he always understood that a ballot vote would be needed to take them back to work. So it is no use claiming that there is too much democracy in the N.U.M. We order things better in my union; we do not ballot to come out on strike, and we probably need only the say so of our chairman to take us back.
What good has that monstrous piece of legislation, the Industrial Relations Act, done us in the miners' dispute, except that everyone is marking time waiting for 28th February, when sympathetic picketing will be made illegal?
I do not think the miners' leaders have been incompetent or inefficient. The difficulty is that once their members have put a ballot vote behind them the members take over. That always happens. That is why we should never allow strikes to begin. I can say, with the benefit of much experience, that at all costs we do not want the ultimate decision to strike to be taken. The threat of the strike is the most powerful weapon of all. The Government fell down here. Joe Gormley and Lawrence Daly have been extremely efficient compared with the inefficiency manifested by the Government.
I remember when I was Minister of Works the present Prime Minister had one favourite form of insult, which was to call someone incompetent. He called me incompetent when I stocked up a few million more bricks than we could absorb in 1965. But that is nothing to the number of bricks the right hon. Gentleman has dropped since then. I stocked them up against 400,000 houses. He has dropped his bricks for the greatest industrial calamity we have had since the war. It is the Prime Minister who has brooded over the present situation. I wish that he were here so that I could tell him so. Nature always intended him to be a commissar. He would be very efficient as one of the bureaucrats at Brussels. But he lacks the sympathy, the ranging mind, to encompass a situation like the present.
I listened to the Prime Minister's speech last Friday evening to a Conservative party conference. My experience of party conferences is that if this House is a hot house sometimes, party conferences are a mad house. But the Prime Minister savoured the occasion to the full. He made a speech of sustained arrogance. There was not one word of compassion in it, not one word of comprehension. He thought the miners were had men, striking because they were wicked, instead of good men passionately believing they are right. [HON. MEMBERS: "Nonsense."] That is the fact. Conservative hon. Members never understand that. They must understand that on both sides


of the argument there are good men who passionately believe they are right. It was an arrogant speech in every way.
The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry is in one of the super-Ministries. I sympathise with him; I think they are too big. He has under him Ministers such as the hon. Member for Bournemouth, West (Sir J. Eden). It must be very difficult to keep control over that lot. No one will mistake the absolute surprise evident in the right hon. Gentleman on Friday. He had just discovered something. Two or three days earlier, he had been harping on the pickets, and on television over the weekend he expressed his astonishment that the miners should have picketed power stations. Did he think they would stand at the top of coal mines as they did in 1926? What use would that be? They are not as unintelligent as that. Now we read stories in the Daily Mail this morning that the right hon. Gentleman did not attend the Cabinet Committee that dealt with the situation but sent along the Minister for Industry, one of his subordinates. Whether the hon. Gentleman alerted the Committee to the gravity of the situation, I do not know, but no one who has ever been a Minister can doubt that there has been a complete breakdown in communications between one Department and another.
Reading the report in HANSARD of what was said on Friday morning, reading first the statement of the Secretary of State for Employment and then what the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry said, we would not think they were members of the same Government. The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry came late to this House. It is a very funny place. It has been the political graveyard of many businessmen. Generally speaking, the right hon. Gentleman is a very agreeable sort of man, but he has shown a degree of naivety near to ignorance throughout his career on industrial relations. Yet he is the ex-boss of the C.B.I. He did not have a very good liaison with it over the strike. I have never known a crisis come upon the country in the way the present crisis has come.
The Secretary of State for Employment always comes here in a spirit of unctuous rectitude. He always has the idea that

God is on his side. But we had had under him a steady drift towards this crisis. When I used to listen to him on the Industrial Relations Act I often wondered, "Has he ever read any industrial history?" It was once said of Montgomery that he did not know the nature of the men he tried to lead. The Government do not know the nature of the men they try to legislate for. So the crisis has come upon us.
We have a great deal of sympathy with the Home Secretary. The affairs of Ulster must have pressed heavily upon him, otherwise he could not have given the string of silly answers he gave last week. It did not dawn on him until three days after he had been questioned that the circular to the police he sent out on Friday would have settled most of the problems of picketing.
I suppose that we must have some sympathy with the Chairman of the N.C.B. too. He has been in a principal position in the Board since 1947. He has had different chairmen, and for the past 10 years has probably had an overbearing one in Lord Robens. I wonder what would have happened in the dispute if Lord Robens had been chairman. Would he have faced up to the Ministries? We have the impression that Mr. Ezra is not the master in his own house. Looming over all the problems we see the Government directives.
If last week's offer was near to being accepted, it might have been accepted if the strike had not been allowed to start. I do not know. But at the end of the day Wilberforce may very well give an award that the miners will be willing to accept. If they do, it would be just as well to have had that at the beginning rather than at the end. The miners' pay and conditions cannot be equated merely to a matter of book keeping. George Bernard Shaw asked, "Who is going to do the dirty work under Socialism?" It has to be paid for one way or another. There is still abroad in the land—

Mr. Burden: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Pannell: No. The hon. Gentleman does not help the debate very much. He just talks about irrelevancies.

Mr. Burden: Talk about irrelevancies!

Mr. Pannell: I asked, quoting Shaw, "Who will do the dirty work under Socialism?" That is a relevant matter.
The numbers of blue collar workers in our society are falling, and the numbers of white collar workers are rising. The white collar worker in the main is rewarded and valued in society more than the blue collar worker is. This poses the old question that we tend to undervalue the men who work with their hands and to overvalue the jobs of those who write about them. This has happened all the way along.
The strike has been breaking out for months. I have no mines in my constituency but some miners do live in it. It is in the cradle of the industrial revolution of which mining has been the centre. These men are not postmen undermined by telephonists and others. They are almost an aristocracy of unrest throughout the labour movement. If one equates this situation with military terms, they are the brigade of guards of the labour movement. They are people who stand and fight, and as I have said before in this House the best trade unionist is the man with the qualities of the British infantryman who will stand and fight and has the qualities of cohesion and loyalty and of not breaking in a losing battle. But this Government look upon such qualities as obstinacy and bloody-mindedness. They turn the argument upside down—there is no question of that. I warn the Government that these are not troops who will break. One of the truths in life is that, for the coward, moral degradation and death are certain, but for the rebel there is always the hope to conquer, and the capacity to resist is always infinitely nobler than the faculty to succumb. These men will not succumb. They will stand.
I hope that, at the end of this week, the award will be a good one, but what have the Government said? They have said that they will accept the award. But it did not really need the miners to agree and nor did it really need the National Coal Board to agree to an inquiry. The duty of the Government is to intervene when no one agrees. On 24th January, I asked the Secretary of State for an inquiry. He gave the usual glib answer that neither side would agree. Cannot he understand that the object of the in

quiry this week is to get a realistic figure? The Government's figure was not realistic. If an inquiry had been appointed earlier and produced a figure, we would have been well on the way to a settlement, although the miners did not agree then to an inquiry being set up. The question of leadership of men on strike is difficult. No one wants to lose face. But sometimes a Government should have the guts to govern or the grace to get out. As the Government have not the first quality, hope that they will have the second.

5.54 p.m.

Mr. Peter Fry: I hope that the right hon. Member for Leeds, West (Mr. C. Pannell) will not mind if I do not follow him in his speech, save for the comment that if he is comparing the leadership of the Government with that provided by Field-Marshal Montgomery, I take it as a great compliment to the Government.
Like most hon. Members, I spent a lot of time this weekend talking and listening to my constituents. One thing which emerged among the sympathies expressed was very real concern for the plight of the elderly. Over and over again, in personal interviews and on the radio, one hears that the main regret is the difficulties that the old are experiencing. It is true that in some areas voluntary committees have been set up whose sole object is to care for the elderly. There are local services and other organisations like the W.R.V.S. which help with fuel and clothing. Many individuals also are trying to do something constructive. One individual in my constituency has advertised for all the wood he can get and he is prepared to distribute it to those in need.
What is misisng in many parts of the country is an element of co-ordination. There are many more people who would like to help but who do not know how to set about it. Others know of old people who need assistance but do not know whom to contact. It must be realised that the problem is greater than that of fuel supply alone. There is the question of extra food and clothing, which often help in the absence of power. Too, often. for example, the number of meals on wheels served is well below what is needed in normal times. This is due to a variety of reasons but it is particularly regrettable at present. I believe that many


individual people would be glad to prepare extra meals if they only knew for whom they should be provided.
My first question to the Government, therefore, is whether they are satisfied that no further co-ordination is necessary. If they are not so satisfied, could they not suggest to local authorities that emergency arrangements should be set up in each district council area—perhaps an emergency committee chaired by the mayor or the chairman of the local authority which could co-ordinate all the efforts of help offered by voluntary bodies or individuals, channelling them to all those needing aid? The advertising in the Press or on radio of one local telephone number or address to which all queries should be directed would in itself be of enormous value. I think that this would do much to harness the immense good will which exists. I am not trying to denigrate the tremendous amount of good already being done by various organisations, but I suggest that many districts would benefit from my suggestion.
My second question is being argued by many of my constituents. Are the Government satisfied not only with the way in which picketing has taken place but also with the way in which illegal picketing has been dealt with? Many people are genuinely alarmed not only by the illegal acts—few or many as they may be—but by the fact that there appears to be an open defiance of the law. They are seriously asking whether the rule of law is not in danger, not just in this dispute but through the deplorable precedent which unfortunately it has set.
No one, except perhaps some hon. Members opposite, would ever consider the miners to be the gentlest of men who would not dream of using harsh words and actions—indeed, the miners would not be the men they are if they behaved so. But while one agrees that they are entitled to peaceful picketing, there has been a series of disturbing events. Power station workers have been prevented in some cases from getting to work—it happened this morning in Scotland. This has happened even though the national consequences are known. "The right to work"—a phrase I often hear on the lips of hon. Members opposite. "The right to work" of many workers is being denied by the miners and this danger is

as inherent in the present dispute as disrespect for the law is symptomatic of the age in which we live, and it has aroused widespread fears. Those fears will not be allayed by the speech of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary today.

Mr. Frank Marsden: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that there are power stations which are not being picketed but which, although they are oil-fired, are not working to full capacity? One of them, the Clarence Dock power station, is in my constituency. It is capable of working to full capacity but it is not doing so at present and the workers at the station are kicking up a fuss about it. Is he aware of situations such as that?

Mr. Fry: The hon. Gentleman must recall the preface to my remarks. No one has denied that some incidents have taken place. I suggest that the people look to their elected Government to protect the nation's interests.
I must ask my right hon. Friend whether the Government are satisfied that the state of the law and the advice to chief constables is sufficient to give that protection, not only during this strike but in the further struggles which this unfortunate precedent may well produce. There is considerable uneasiness abroad at this moment and it is the Government's job to take action to reassure public opinion.
My third and last question relates to the coal industry itself. As a former opponent of the hon. Member for Nottingham, North (Mr. Whitlock), I must say to him that I have seen the conditions underground in which miners have to work. It is still a dangerous and dirty job, though not quite as bad as the public image has it—which owes too much to reissues of "How Green was my Valley". None the less, I accept that coal mining is an industry which most people would not enter and as such the miner is entitled to a reasonable wage.
Furthermore, I do not think it is civilised that we should ask men to spend their working lives underground tearing out coal from the bowels of the earth. Surely it is not beyond the wit of modern technology to develop alternative sources of power. Successive Governments have interfered with the plans of the power industry and virtually enforced the use of coal rather than substitutes.
Let us by all means settle the dispute, let us end the misery, but I ask my right hon. Friend whether the Government are prepared to look forward to the day when we do not have to ask anybody in this country to earn their living in such a dangerous and dirty occupation. I hope the Government will address themselves to this question and to the other two which I have asked this afternoon.

6.2 p.m.

Mr. John Mendelson: The hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Fry) has repeated this afternoon a fair amount of the claptrap we heard before this dispute developed into a strike. It is because some of Her Majesty's Ministers have been enthused with the same kind of miscalculations and unrealistic views about the position that the country is facing this grim crisis.
I am still waiting for the searching questions to be put by hon. Gentlemen opposite which we have been promised in the national newspapers. There have been reports by allegedly well-informed political correspondents that we are to hear a great many searching questions concerning the maladministration of their own Government. So far we have heard very little of them. Instead, we have had the dangerous and foolish language produced by the hon. Member for the Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Tugendhat), who talked about the miners holding the country to ransom—no doubt foreshadowing other language about waging war against the country which he will use in a fortnight, if the strike is not settled by then.
I gave notice to the hon. Gentleman that I intended to mention him in my speech and therefore I feel free to examine what he said. The hon. Gentleman engaged in very foolish language indeed. He has no knowledge or understanding of the deep feeling among the mining communities and of the steadying attitude of the mining communities, including all the workers in those places whether or not they are engaged in coal mining. He is wrong to think that he is making a serious contribution to this debate if he follows his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister in the foolish attempt to hound the miners and to put them publicly in the wrong—a tactic in which the Prime Minister tried to engage in his speech on Friday night.

Mr. Tugendhat: rose—

Mr. Mendelson: Not yet—I will give way in a moment when I have finished with the hon. Gentleman. [HON. MEMBERS: "Give way."] It is not up to any hon. Member to tell me to whom to give way. We will settle this among ourselves. The hon. Gentleman has no more understanding than has his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister of the feelings that exist in those communities. He has no understanding of the views of workers in engineering and steel who are expressing their solidarity with their fellow workers in the coal mining industry. He ought to know that he should desist from indulging in any attempt by propaganda of this kind to try to isolate the miners because he will fail and make an already dangerous situation much worse than it is today.

Mr. Tugendhat: Nobody who heard my speech could accuse me of hounding the miners [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] I went out of my way to pay tribute to their special condition. I did, however, say that if they refused to go hack when they can do so without prejudice, this would be taken as holding the nation to ransom. There are millions of people—not in the engineering industry, but people who live in London—who will be prepared to testify to this at the moment. And the hon. Gentleman has only to go outside the Palace of Westminster into my constituency to speak to people who take that view.

Mr. Mendelson: I know the hon. Gentleman used that term, having said a number of other things, but that does not make his offence any less great. [Interruption.] It is no good hon. Gentlemen shouting; they will have their opportunity. It is that sort of attitude which has led to the disastrous incompetence of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and to the misguided attitude of the Prime Minister throughout this dispute.
First of all, there has been sheer incompetence. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Knutsford (Mr. John Davies) told the House some 72 hours ago that one of the main tasks of the people running the depôt at Saltley in Birmingham was to concentrate on those special deliveries which were particularly essential and which were agreed between


the two sides in the dispute. He said they were not delivered in such a way to retailers; they were delivered only to other large wholesalers and there could not be any special deliveries. I will tell the right hon. Gentleman that they are now making special deliveries and they are in an agreement which the union has wanted for some time.

The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (Mr. John Davies): The hon. Gentleman is of course wrong. The depôt in question is delivering only to wholesalers; it cannot know to which ultimate destinations the coke in question will go, and it is prepared to receive undertakings, as also is the N.U.M. I say this so that the record should be correct.

Mr. Mendelson: It is this matter of undertakings which the two sides have always been prepared to accept, and the men running Saltley had no instructions—

Mr. Davies: The hon. Gentleman obviously did not quite catch what I said. The point is that they cannot be sure where their coke goes because they do not deliver from that depôt to the ultimate consumer.

Mr. Mendelson: Of course they cannot be sure in any detailed case, but what the right hon. Gentleman has failed to do is to give them instructions to engage in that kind of delivery. He is now reversing his position.

Mr. Burden: No.

Mr. Mendelson: Yes, he is; he is reversing the position, and I will come to the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary to show that he, too, within four days has reversed his position.
The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry has a duty to ensure that the two sides get together under his instructions to man and run the depôt. [Interruption.] The lights have gone out in the Chamber, but despite that I will continue my speech.
It is this sheer incompetence which has been responsible for this crisis and which in a similar situation in private industry would have led to a demand for the chairman's immediate resignation. I draw attention to the attitude which the Government are now trying to adopt

and which was characterised by a speech made by the Prime Minister on Friday. First of all, the leaders of the N.U.M. have always been in a negotiating position. They are in a negotiating position now. This point has not been made so far in the debate. From the beginning, the Government have prevented the National Coal Board from engaging in serious negotiation. Time and time again, whenever contacts between the two sides have taken place, Mr. Gormley has said that he was ready to negotiate. By the statement of its president, the N.U.M. is ready to negotiate today. If the Prime Minister wanted to do his job properly he would call the union leaders and the Coal Board to his office this evening and ask them to get together and to negotiate on a realistic basis. He would allow the court of inquiry to continue, because we face a delay of perhaps another 10 days or fortnight—

Mr. Burden: rose

Mr. Mendelson: No. I will not listen to the hon. Member for Gillingham (Mr. Burden). We are having a serious debate, and he ought to keep out of it.

Mr. Burden: rose—

Mr. Mendelson: I will not give way. What the Government have to remember is that if there is a report by the end of this week which makes sense to the N.U.M., there must be negotiation before it is agreed. Then there will have to be, we hope, the most speedy procedure to get the agreement of the men on a recommendation to go back to work. It is in the best interests of the country to short-circuit this procedure. It is still in the hands of the Government. It is still possible for the Prime Minister to adopt the proposals made on Saturday by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition to take an active part in this serious affair and to call the two sides together. That could be done tonight or tomorrow morning. What has been wrong so far is that the Government have pretended that they have nothing to do with the policy pursued in this matter, when everyone knew that they alone were solely responsible—

Mr. Burden: rose—

Mr. Mendelson: I will not give way. In common with others of my hon.


Friends, I have no confidence in the seriousness of interventions made by hon. Gentlemen opposite.

Mr. Tugendhat: What arrogance!

Mr. Mendelson: The hon. Member for Gillingham may not like what I say. However, I do not seek his support. I represent the point of view of my constituents. If the hon. Gentleman cares to go to South Yorkshire and to talk to workers in any industry there, they will tell him where he gets off. I am representing them in telling him the same.
I move, then, to my last but one point. It concerns the allegations about picketing. The Home Secretary gave us a brief exposition of the other side of the case. However, the problem of maintaining law and order is a serious one. One of my constituents told me over the weekend that during the picketing in Birmingham what happened in many cases was that some of the people who wanted a quiet word with one of the non-union drivers trying to rush into the depôt—incidentally, causing most of the trouble which occurred—were never in a position to make the first approach to the lorry driver in order to put their case to him as they are entitled to do by law.
This is the kernel of the debate. It is not the claptrap about law and order and illegal picketing in which the right hon. Gentleman indulged as the centre piece of this debate—

Mr. Arthur Lewis: My hon. Friend knows that I am the only Member present who has taken part in picketing as a Member of Parliament—

Mr. Skinner: I have lived on a picket line.

Mr. Lewis: I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) will allow me to finish. I was about to say that I am the only Member who has taken part in picketing and had the experience of the police intervening and of being arrested. I was told by the police that they would stop anyone speaking to anyone else if they wanted to and that, if did not clear off and if the picketers did not clear off, we would be arrested for obstruction. That is what is going on throughout the country at the present time.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I hope that hon. Members will not interrupt too much. So far, we have managed to get in seven speeches, averaging 13 minutes each, from hon. Members on the back benches. A great many hon. Members wish to speak, and I hope to be able to call as many as possible.

Mr. Mendelson: I knew that my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis), along with others on this side of the House, had practical experience. For that reason, I did not want to prevent him making his contribution.
I return to my point that the first perfectly legal approach was impossible in many cases. The situation varies. We have also had reports from many parts of the country, including South Yorkshire, that chiefs of police have shown great consideration for the democratic rights of our constituents, and the situation has been very good throughout. As a result of the Telex message sent by the Home Secretary, albeit a little belatedly, I hope that there will be a good development in terms of the legal rights of our constituents to picket peacefully.
I turn finally to the prognostications from the chairman of the Central Electricity Generating Board. He told the country that the board had stocks for 12 or 13 weeks, that no one had to worry, and that everything was all right. If there were ever a case for resignation, it is that gentleman, and he should take with him those people whose strategy was hidden behind those boastful statements.
What was in the Government's minds, faced with this serious strike? We were told that coal was not so important, that miners were not needed so much, and that we could get on without them. How that claptrap has been shown up in the country. We have the worst industrial crisis that we have experienced for many years.
Behind the statements of the Generating Board's chairman and others was the Government's intention to beat down the miners and to show them that they could not possibly succeed with their justified claim. The naked class policy of this Government showed itself in their attitude, and they must not be allowed to escape their responsibility.
My hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams) said that the


policies of this Government had divided the nation and made it imperative for unions such as the N.U.M. to make substantial wage claims. By their naked class policy, they are dividing the nation further. One of the important messages which must go out from this House is that we are not voting tonight on technical measures that this Government have brought upon the country by their irresponsible policies. We are rejecting, on behalf of the majority of our fellow countrymen, a disastrous Government who by incompetence and naked class policies will bring the country to rack and ruin if they are allowed to remain in office a day longer.

6.20 p.m.

Mr. Michael Grylls: I will not follow the hon. Member for Penis-stone (Mr. John Mendelson) in his remarks. It seemed to me that the hon. Gentleman was as inaccurate in the light as in the darkness. I will leave the matter there.
The right hon. Member for Fulham (Mr. Michael Stewart) talked about the Government's policy against prices and wages and said that it had not changed very much since the Government came to power. The right hon. Gentleman should be reminded of two facts. In the first six months of 1971 prices went up by 13·2 per cent. In the last six months of 1971 they went up by only 5·5 per cent. This is what the Government have been trying to achieve. They have been trying to slow down the rate of increase in prices for the good of all our people.
As British industry is busy adjusting to short-time and lay-offs as a result of the strike, I believe that people generally are increasingly asking, as my hon Friend the Member for the Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Tugendhat) said: why should we be held to ransom by the N.U.M. leaders who are purporting to act in the names of all the miners? People are saying that it is time to take stock whether one section of the community should be able, in a situation like this, to tyrannise all our citizens.
Last week we had one tragic death of a miner on picket duty, and a few days ago two young boys of 14 were killed while trying to collect coal. I ask hon. Gentleman opposite who are encouraging

the strike: how many more deaths are there to be in either picketing or accidents, because they will be responsible for what happens? There has been a lot of talk of a great deal of sympathy—

Mr. Neil Kinnock: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I hesitate to interrupt the debate, but the hon. Gentleman is asserting that in some way or other the deaths caused during the coal strike are the fault of the N.U.M. That is quite wrong.

Mr. Speaker: That is a comment, not a point of order.

Mr. Grylls: I was remarking that the deaths were as a result of the strike. I am not suggesting who is directly responsible. That is a matter for legal process. I am pointing out that these accidents, tragic as they are—we should not make too much or too light of them—have been as a result of the strike.
There has been a lot of talk of sympathy for the miners. I do not think that "sympathy" is quite the right word. We admire the job that the miners do. It is a dirty, unhealthy and dangerous job. But there are many other such jobs in this country. The seamen have a dangerous job, the dustmen have a very dirty job, and the nurses frequently have an unpleasant job.
It is very unpleasant for old-age pensioners who are struggling with no light or coal to keep body and soul together. I wonder how many old-age pensioners' lives have been made unpleasant as a result of this struggle. I wonder how many handicapped people are facing even greater difficulties and others who are ill with no electric light or warmth to keep them going. By what divine right does Mr. Gormley believe that he can induce the kind of suffering that the country is beginning to have and will increasingly have as the weeks go by?
It is widely said that the miners have a cast-iron case for a 35 to 47 per cent. rise. But do they have a just claim for that degree of increase when we consider miners' productivity in 1967–68 went up by 6·6 per cent., but in 1970–71 went up by only 1·7 per cent.? Their productivity in the last few years has been almost on a plateau. On a productivity basis alone there seems hardly any justification for a


claim which would cost the National Coal Board £130 million.
I believe that some hon. Gentlemen opposite who are so keen to encourage this strike and conflict are encouraging it as a direct confrontation against the Government and my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. The Government have been trying to keep wage rises within a reasonable level so that the public can have a reasonable level of prices. I notice that the Opposition have a great deal of fun and seem to enjoy it when they point out that prices have risen by so much at the end of a certain period. Yet they are encouraging or inciting us to give way to a 35 to 47 per cent. increase. Surely we are fighting for the consumer and for the housewife.

Mr. John: rose—

Mr. Grylls: These are two sections of the community for whom the Opposition seem to care not a jot, and the Leader of the Opposition in a childish speech at Cheltenham on Saturday tried to incite the Government to do just that. I suggest that the right hon. Gentleman's motto might be, "Pay them more", because this is what he was saying. The right hon. Gentleman was trying to persuade the Prime Minister to ask the miners to 10, Downing Street, to give them some beer and sandwiches, and to pay them twice what they are asking.

Mr. John: In what ways would the hon. Gentleman say that the fair rents policy is a battle on behalf of the consumer with projected rent rises which will double council house rents?

Mr. Grylls: I was interested when the hon. Lady for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams) mentioned rents in her speech. My information is that many miners have Coal Board houses anyway. If the hon. Gentleman wants to know about this matter, he can easily ask the people who will benefit from rebates when the Housing Bill is passed. Under the provisions of that Bill many people living in privately rented accommodation will, for the first time, have rebates.
It may be that the miners and some of their leaders do not care about the price of coal, but my constituents and many other people throughout the country care very much indeed. Unlike the miners, my constituents do not get a great deal of coal free.

Mr. J. D. Concannon: What is the price of a ton of coal?

Mr. Grylls: The price of coal has gone up by 77 per cent. since 1962. If we were to give way to this full claim, it would mean a further rise of 15 per cent.

Mr. Concannon: What is the price of a ton of coal?

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must not ask questions from a sedentary position.

Mr. Grylls: The miners have had a generous offer indeed, an increased offer from the National Coal Board.

Mr. Concannon: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Grylls: I will not give way. I am trying to be brief. I believe that the miners should wait while the Wilberforce Inquiry is sitting, and it is a tragedy that in the meanwhile they will not return. The insensitivity of a number of the miners' leaders, helped and encouraged by Members of the Opposition today, to the suffering of the public is quite frightening. They are as insensitive as Marie Antoinette when she said, "Let them eat cake."
I am glad that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said that he felt it would be helpful for the House to know that he would look further into the question of illegal picketing. I believe that members of the public are very worried about the situation. Many people are not clear what is legal and how far pickets are able to go in this kind of situation. I hope that the Government will give urgent and careful consideration to this problem as soon as possible and will confirm that, after 28th February, it will be an unfair industrial practice for an industrial dispute to be extended to extraneous parties. I believe that, in many instances, the physical blockading of power stations and the cutting off of them from the coal and coke supplies which they have bought and paid for is something which many people find intolerable.
If the miners stubbornly resist going back to work pending the outcome of the inquiry they will, and rightly, begin to lose a lot of the sympathy and admiration which they have throughout the country. I trust that the shock of this emergency


will make them persuade their leaders to think again. I hope that they will make them see the danger of the situation to their jobs and to the jobs of millions of others. I hope too, that when the miners have thought about it, perhaps as a result of today's debate, they will consider going back to work right away with the award they have been promised by the board, wait to see what Wilberforce has to say, and then the country can get on with its job.

6.31 p.m.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: I should like to begin by referring to two or three points made by hon. Gentlemen opposite. I might, in passing, refer to something that was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams), but that depends on the time and how things go.
I start by dealing with what was said by the hon. Member for Chertsey (Mr. Grylls). I realise that he has a number of coal mines in his constituency. The hon. Gentleman referred to the revised offer that was put to the miners a few days ago. It might benefit the hon. Gentleman, and I am sure that it will benefit the House—certainly this side of it—if I explain as briefly as possible what this so-called revised, improved offer was all about.
Despite what the Secretary of State for Employment said in the House on Friday morning, in total terms the revised offer represented something worse than the previous offer. Before going any further, let me deal with what was said by my colleague in the mining industry, the President of the N.U.M., Mr. Gormley. I am referring to his comment at the weekend about the miners possibly accepting this offer, and hon. Gentlemen opposite asking how the revised offer can be worse than the previous one if the miners are prepared to accept it. What Mr. Gormley was saying was not that the miners might have accepted the offer as it is, but that they could have accepted that kind of money over a twelve-month period. There is a lot of difference between the two, and I hope that the Daily Telegraph—I do not see any of its reporters present—will note that and mention it tomorrow.
What was the offer? It was a £22 basic minimum for people on the surface. No explanation was given of how the odd £1 would be paid. When some of my colleagues on the national executive asked the board how it was to be paid, the board had not a clue. We can dismiss the industrial relations officer from the scene, because he has had nothing to do with the negotiations. He has not said a word all the time they have been going on. When Ezra was asked for an explanation about the £1, he did not know the answer. The reason was that he was under instruction to put forward an offer which conformed to the 7 per cent. to 8 per cent. guideline which on some occasions the Government say they have not laid down but on others they say they have laid down. As I explained to the Minister on Friday, if he does not want to believe my arithmetic, perhaps he will accept the arithmetic of his hon. Friend the Member for Oswestry (Mr. Biffen) who supported my view.
Nobody from the benches opposite has explained why, in the revised offer, five days' holiday were taken away from the miners. In the original offer there was a reference to £2, and £1·90 in some cases, and five days' extra holiday, which Ezra, after being questioned at the negotiating table some weeks ago, said would not cost any money. I do not know how he came to that conclusion, but that was the point he made. The board was proposing to do away with the five extra days' holiday. There was a £22 basic, but in fact it was only £21 basic. If a man did not turn up for one of the five days, he lost it, but that was not fully explained. We then had the galling experience of having to acknowledge that the claim would be over 22 months, which in practical terms represents two years.

Mr. T. H. H. Skeet: If the hon. Gentleman says that these two claims are the same, how does he explain the fact that the first offer would cost the board £32 million but the second would cost £48 million, for one year?

Mr. Skinner: It is true that I obtained a distinction in mathematics, but I do not want to explain that. All I want to say is that this sum of £48 million spread over 22 months represents 24 months in practical terms, because the organisation of the N.U.M. is such that a pay claim


begins in January or February of a given year, it goes to the national congress in July, and gets to the negotiating table in about October or November. It was, therefore, a two-year offer, representing an increase of about 6 per cent.
Far from being a better offer, the miners, without an Oxford education—which they do not need—reckoned the matter up in a few moments and notwithstanding what their leaders might say, decided, in unison, and in no mistakable terms, at mass meetings throughout the coalfields, that they did not want anything to do with the revised offer, and if the court of inquiry comes up with something not much different, then, however much hon. Gentlemen opposite may rave and bawl about the miners holding the country to ransom, they will not go back to work. They will not return unless they find about £5 or more coming from Lord Wilberforce.

Mr. Skeet: That is a threat.

Mr. Skinner: Perhaps it is.
At the weekend it was suggested by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition that the Home Secretary was rather like Yogi Bear. I think that that is a bit unfair to Yogi Bear. The Home Secretary talked about picketing, and made a dangerous suggestion about the procedure needing to be changed. I have been on picket duty on many occasions during this dispute. I may say that I had a lot of practice at it beforehand. I was with a picket on the first Tuesday after the strike broke. I was asked to address a number of lads who had gone to the Bolsover Coalite plant because they were disturbed about what was happening. Only about 15 miners were present, and about the same number of police. The police, who were young, raw recruits and should not have been there, were urging lorry drivers to "step on it". Those were the words to the drivers who wanted to get through the gates of the Coalite plant.
I put a stop to that, but the important thing is to remember is that someone in the Derbyshire Constabulary—probably the chief inspector himself, but I do not know—decided to alter the policy. The following day about 12 old-fashioned constables appeared on the scene, and immediately the whole atmosphere changed. One miner who was feeling the cold decided to wear a pair of his wife's

tights underneath his trousers to keep himself warm, and he found them very effective, and when the chief inspector heard about it he decided that he, too, would wear a pair of his wife's tights.
Violence at the picket lines is isolated. I cannot prove it, but I have a good idea what it is all about. The Birmingham Gas Works incident was admirably covered by some of my hon. Friends. It was a great day for the miners and for the trade union and Labour movement.

Mr. Churchill: What about the country?

Mr. Skinner: As far as I am concerned I have come to this House not to speak impartially, in the round, looking after everybody's interests; I have come here to speak for the miners, the working class, the trade union and Labour movement and no one else. I am certain that the rest of the country will be looked after by the establishment, the Treasury Bench and hon. Members opposite. We are always hearing about this so-called national interest having it rammed down our throats. The miners were looking after the national interest for 20 or 25 years and they collaborated and cooperated so that that national interest was undisturbed. They are not doing it now and I am pleased that they are not doing it.

Mr. Kenneth Lewis: What about the old people?

Mr. Skinner: They are looking after the old people, too. The miners have a good record for looking after the old people. They provide the old people in their communities with free coal, not coal from the Coal Board. This is something that hon. Members opposite can never understand. That is why the Prime Minister made the sort of speech he did last Friday night, because he does not understand the miners.

Mr. David Crouch: Would the hon. Gentleman care to adopt a more friendly attitude in this debate, more typical of the miners' attitude in this dispute?

Mr. Edwin Wainwright: Give him a kiss.

Mr. Skinner: I understand that the hon. Gentleman has a few miners in his


constituency. I suppose he will be pouring out his crocodile tears as hon. Members opposite usually do when a few miners are around. Although the hon. Gentleman is involved in the mining industry to some extent—I do not want to expand on it but I could.
The most important question of all is: where is the money coming from to ensure that the miners get a fair deal?

Mr. Kenneth Lewis: From the rest of the community.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I am not favouring one side more than another but it is intolerable to have these constant sedentary interruptions.

Mr. Skinner: It is intolerable, Mr. Speaker. I sit here quietly all the time never saying a word to anyone yet now I am being heckled, almost embarrassed. What the N.C.B. needs—my hon. Friends acknowledge it and I believe that some hon. Members opposite recognise that they will have to do so—is a capital reconstruction. Since 1967, £1,700 million has been paid out to private industry in one form or another, in investment grants, tax allowances and so on. There has been nothing for the Coal Board. If the Board had been able to take advantage of regional employment premium it would have meant another £40 million for its coffers.
Since 1965, when the last capital write-off of £415 million took place, there has been a total of £2,350 million written off within the rest of the public industries. The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry has not yet met the leadership of the N.U.M. He has met Mr. Ezra. He must now get round the table with Mr. Ezra and the rest of the Coal Board to see to it that the extra money that will be needed after Wilberforce can be found and ensure that the Coal Board is never again placed in this position. I am sure that this will have activated even his mind.
The Court of Inquiry will be reporting shortly. No doubt reams of paper will be used but the net result will surely be a settlement, notwithstanding all the evidence, which will get the miners back to work. There is nothing so sure as that because if it fails to produce an amount that satisfies the industry then

the establishment is in for a really rough time.

Mr. Rost: The hon. Gentleman means the public.

Mr. Skinner: Representing, as I do to some extent, the interests of the miners, I will not suggest what kind of compromise there could be. What I have said at the mass meetings is that the only compromise I would settle for, instead of £26–£28–£35, is £27–£29–£36. The Government have completely ignored the Industrial Relations Act. Instead of using the secret ballot the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, the Prime Minister and the whole of the Treasury Bench will be urging the miners to ignore the Act, to hold mass meetings in every Miners' Welfare that can be found to get the miners back. We shall remember that in future.
The person truly responsible for this is not present today; he has dodged it again. That man is the Prime Minister. He decided, along with his colleagues, to take on the miners as far back as 3rd December, 1970. That was when he instructed the Secretary of State of Trade and Industry, through one of his minions, to lift the ban on imported coal. That was when the conflict began. "Lift the ban on imported coal, improve the stocking, position, make the British Steel Corporation and the Central Electricity Generating Board buy coal at twice the price so that there is plenty in stock," he said. He decided to take on the miners; and he decided to take on the bedrock of the Labour movement when he did that.
The master of "Morning Cloud" is now washed up on that bedrock, and almost all the people acknowledge that. He has made a complete blunder. He has failed, as a result of what the miners have decided to do in the last six weeks. There is no doubt that there has to be a settlement that will get them back to work, and it has to be a big settlement. I like to hear the establishment, the Cabinet, and the Treasury Bench squealing as they have been in the last few weeks. I like the sound of that music, I hope that I can hear it right up to the ballot box and a General Election.

6.48 p.m.

Mr. Emlyn Hooson: The hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) frankly told the House that he


was partisan in his approach, as though that had escaped the attention of the House. Hon. and right hon. Members opposite shouted at him, "What about the national interest?" as though they took the view that it was the Government's duty to serve the national interest—and so they should. If they think that this Government have served the national interest through their attitude towards this dispute they have made a grave mistake. Moderate opinion in this country, whether among Labour, Conservative or Liberal supporters, thinks that this Government have gravely mishandled the situation.
By their attitude the Government have first of all been completely insensitive and unsympathetic towards the miners' claim. They have disappointed all those who believed that there should have been a more sensitive and sympathetic approach. The Government adopted, as many Tory Governments have done in the past, an intransigent belligerence to begin with and then went soft when it was too late. If they wanted to adopt a tough policy—and there are many who believe they should; many hon. Members opposite, from what they have said and shouted, believe that—then the Government have been grossly incompetent. They have failed on both counts.

Mr. Kenneth Lewis: The hon. and learned Gentleman said that a large number of hon. Members on this side of the House believe that the Government should have adopted a tough policy towards the miners. This is not true. We have always taken the line that the Government should take a fair attitude on this dispute as between the needs of the miners and the community. This is what we have said and this is what we hope Wilberforce will do.

Mr. Hooson: Like many of his colleagues, the hon. Member for Rutland and Stamford (Mr. Kenneth Lewis) likes to talk tough. That was the Prime Minister's demeanour and approach. But if that attitude is to be taken, all I can say is that the Government have been totally incompetent about it. On 18th January, speaking on behalf of my party in the debate on the coal industry, I suggested that it was the Government's duty to intervene to prevent a bitter situation from developing. There was no sign

from the Government spokesman—the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry—of any kind of sympathy for the miners' case. He adopted a tough attitude, virtually repeating the handout from the National Coal Board. He was chided from all sides for doing so.
If that were the line that he intended to follow—it is an understandable although wholly erroneous line; there are people who believe that that line should have been pushed, and who suggest that we must not depart from the 7 per cent.-8 per cent. norm—the line of a trial by ordeal and the use of a blunt weapon in a sophisticated age such as this, the Government should have taken steps to see that they were prepared for the ordeal.
What happened? Towards the end of last week there was complete panic in Government circles. Emergency powers were mentioned. The Secretary of State for Employment did not even call the parties together until emergency powers were in the offing. That was a measure of the total incompetence of the Government. I spoke to some business men today and was very interested in what they had to say about the Government's unpreparedness in taking on the miners. The least that they should have done was to see that the community would not suffer unreasonably.
The community is suffering. We have had the strike and the resulting emergency, and the disruption of power is costing the community millions, if not tens of millions, of pounds. The damage will not be undone for a long time. On 8th February—only a week ago—in the debate on the strike, there was no sign from the Government Front Bench of the danger in which the whole community was placed.
The first charge against the Government is that, having taken up the attitude of not being prepared to give an inch to the miners, they have been totally incompetent in their preparations. They are responsible to the nation, and the major part of the blame for what the nation will suffer falls firmly on their shoulders.

Mr. Skeet: If we are to distribute coal under some provisional arrangement we must be able to come to an arrangement with the National Coal Board. The Government cannot distribute coal; it can be


done only through the unions or the pickets—who have prevented distribution.

Mr. Spriggs: On a point of order. Some hon. Members have consistently raised questions with hon. Members who have been speaking. If that goes on all evening, some of us who have been here all day will not have a chance to speak. May I appeal to you to warn the House, Mr. Speaker?

Mr. Speaker: I do my best.

Mr. Hooson: The hon. Member for Bedford (Mr. Skeet) was not here for the coal industry debate on 8th February, when I pointed out to the Secretary of State for Employment—I happen to have a warm personal regard for him—that he was very much to blame, because he did not call in the union and the Coal Board until emergency powers were upon us. He had to tell both sides that emergency powers were upon us before he called them in. The whole Government posture was wrong.
I was interested to read in the OFFICIAL REPORT the following pertinent quotation, from a speech made on 2nd July, 1970:
It is not a sign of a healthy nation that there are more than 500,000 men, women and young people out of work It is not a sign of a healthy economy when the number of strikes in the first four months of this year was 60 per cent. up on the same period for last year.
—and then other matters are referred to—
It is not a healthy economy when inflation is as rampant as it is today. This is the condemnation of the outgoing regime."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd July, 1970; Vol. 803. c. 87.]
Those are the words of the present Prime Minister in the debate on the Queen's Speech in July, 1970. Every one of those accusations can be levelled against this Government. Their arrogance in the light of the developing crisis in the coal industry has been incredible—matched only by their incompetence.
The miners have a special case. I have put it on record more than once that they were extraordinarily loyal to the Labour Government, who were not particularly kind to them. Many Labour Members—one was the hon. Member for Derbyshire, North-East (Mr. Swain)—protested to the Labour Government in those days because to some degree they

let down the miners. That fact in no way undermines the miners' case today. It is no answer for hon. Members opposite to say that the miners had a larger rise last year than under the last Labour Government. Anybody who had understanding and sympathy with the miners' case would realise that what we have been seeing is an eruption caused by years of frustration.
The hon. Member for the Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Tugendhat) suggested that social criteria should come into play in deciding how to deal with such claims as that of the miners. He said that economic criteria were not sufficent. It was music to my ears to hear that from the Tory benches. That is not what the Prime Minister said in 1970, although it is the attitude that ought to be adopted on all sides, whether one is Socialist, Conservative or Liberal. We must surely all appreciate that social considerations cannot be disregarded.
The miners had a special case. They had been left behind, partly because of their own loyalty. They had allowed the militants to leapfrog over them. How can we expect a community that has been reduced, in terms of its work size, to nearly one-third in 12 or 15 years to stand idly by while the Chrysler workers receive incredible increases in pay? It is contrary to human nature to expect them to accept that situation just because they happen to work for a nationalised industry.
The Government misjudged the mood of the miners, just as they misjudged the mood of the country. There is now a great deal of sympathy for the miners' case. It is true that the public will be greatly inconvenienced. Old people will suffer, as will many others. But most moderate people will agree that the majority of the blame falls upon the Government. This could have been avoided if a much more sympathetic approach to the miners had been adopted. There is no doubt that the community was prepared to accept that the miners had a special case.
In the long run this strike will adversely affect the mining community. We shall end up with far fewer miners, earning much higher pay.

Mr. Skinner: We have heard that before.

Mr. Hooson: The miners themselves must have faced that fact—which proves that they feel themselves to be in a fairly desperate situation. The N.C.B., the Government and the community as a whole will suffer. If, as I believe, my colleagues accept my advice, they will vote against the Government in protest against the grave mishandling of the situation by an incompetent, unsympathetic and insensitive Administration.

7.0 p.m.

Mr. T. H. H. Skeet: This dispute could have been settled simply. We could have paid up precisely what the N.U.M. demanded and that would have been the end of the matter.

Mr. Skinner: Hear, hear.

Mr. Skeet: I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's cheers, but let us consider what the union was seeking. No less than £100 million a year was the demand. The first offer from the N.C.B. was worth £32 million. That was revised up to £48 million over 12 months and £72 million over 18 months. I would have called that an admirable offer. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment indicated that having put out feelers to ascertain whether the union was prepared to negotiate, on two occasions he had found the miners adamant.
The hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) expressed what I hope was a personal view and I interpreted his remarks as those of a revolutionary when he said, in effect, "I am not concerned with the public" but with one segment of society. I agree that it is a tiny part of the whole and that it is a union or caucus against the State.

Mr. Skinner: rose—

Mr. Skeet: I will give way shortly.
I would not have imagined that in 1972 we could have found such a feature in the United Kingdom. The hon. Gentleman is recommending that a single union should defy the power of the State on one claim and that 280,000 workers should be prepared to put millions of people out of work.
The hon. Gentleman will recollect that at the time of the 1926–27 dispute there was a Section in the Trade Disputes Act which made a strike illegal if it was shown to be against the State. That Section was repealed in 1946. Were it

still on the Statute Book there would have been a different approach in this dispute and the strike would have been illegal.

Mr. Skinner: In 1926 the miners went back defeated. In 1972 we are already winning and the only question remaining is the size of the score in our favour.
The hon. Gentleman keeps talking about the State. The State could have intervened on several occasions in this dispute, either before or after the strike broke out. It either would not, could not or dare not. To talk about the miners "taking on" the State is to adduce a puerile argument to hide the fact that the Government have not had the guts to intervene, though they had ample opportunity to do so

Mr. Skeet: One sees the logic, from his point of view, of the hon. Gentleman's argument. "We are winning so therefore we need not negotiate," is the way he looks at it. He is willing to achieve victory at anybody's expense. He is willing for enormous unemployment to be created elsewhere in industry and for there to be dreadful discomfort to old-age pensioners, people in hospital and others in society.

Mr. Thomas Swain: What utter rubbish.

Mr. Skeet: That is the obvious consequence of the policy which the hon. Memver for Bolsover is advocating.

Mr. Skinner: It is the hon. Gentleman's policy.

Mr. Skeet: I turn to more profitable arguments. I am concerned about this industry and I have spoken in most of our coal debates. I recently adduced some figures for the industry and on the last occasion I quoted retail prices for fuel, taking 1962 as the base year with 100 points. The increases were, for oil, 127 points; gas, 133; electricity, 149; and coal, 177. Those figures related to three months of 1971.
If, as a result of a settlement of this dispute—it is clear that, whatever settlement is reached, it will be an expensive one—the N.C.B. must pay a significant increase, that sum will have to be added to the price paid by its principal buyer, which is the C.E.G.B. The hon. Lady the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams) mentioned this. The C.E.G.B.


will pay more and, of course, that will be passed on to its consumers, who are the B.S.C. and the public.
I repeat that I am concerned about the coal mining industry. It is clear that if it cannot be competitive it will go under. This is why the N.C.B. has been at pains to make it a workable and viable industry. Not long ago its Chairman reported, in effect, "I believe that the coal industry has reached the point of viability." He made a pledge to the miners that if they accepted his proposition this year, there would be more in the kitty next year. Unfortunately, another £75 million was added to the N.C.B.'s liabilities, and where we go from here I do not know.
The hon. Member for Hitchin refused to mention several matters in her speech including the burden on the electricity industry. I am, of course, referring to an industry which takes about 75 per cent. of its fuel from one sector, which is coal. Is it not high time, when we have two such gigantic State monopolies, that we had a certain amount of flexibility in fuel supplies?
It seems extraordinary that the C.E.G.B. cannot buy its own gas from the Continental Shelf or that it is forced to take coal at exorbitant prices. What will be the argument of the C.E.G.B. when it finds that it must pay perhaps 10 per cent. or 15 per cent. more for its coal? This is not the way to run State industries. Nor is it the way to run the economy.

Mr. Charles Loughlin: The hon. Gentleman has referred at least twice to coal prices. Would he care to say what the C.E.G.B. is charged for coal? If he does not reveal the figure I will do so if I have an opportunity to speak in the debate.

Mr. Skeet: It pays the equivalent of just under 4·5p per therm.

Mr. Loughlin: How much per ton?

Mr. Skeet: It is roughly equivalent to fuel oil.

Mr. Concannon: rose—

Mr. Skeet: I will not give way to the hon. Gentleman. He is a Whip and should know his place.

Mr. Kinnock: I am not a Whip. Will the hon. Gentleman give way to me?

Mr. Skeet: No.

Mr. Loughlin: How much per ton is the C.E.G.B. having to pay?

Mr. Skeet: It is equivalent to just under 4·5p per therm. I have answered the hon. Gentleman's question—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."]—and I have given a good answer.
Like hon. Members generally, I am concerned about this industry and there are two factors to be borne in mind in the present situation. The first is that the miners have been given a lucrative offer. The second is that they had increases in 1967, 1968, 1969 and 1970. In the last two years there have been unofficial strikes and this year we have an official one. The miner's standard of living relative to that of his colleagues in the economy fell under the Labour Government but fortunately it has been rising under the Conservatives.—[Interruption.]
The hon. Member for Hitchin recognised this and she pointed out certain improved pension rights that the miners had received. I intervened to say that pension rights were not the same as additional pay. But even on that score they have done remarkably well.

Mr. Skinner: The hon. Gentleman is talking nonsense.

Mr. Skeet: There are many matters with which I would like to deal but I shall be brief in view of the number of hon. Members who still wish to participate in the debate.
I would have thought that the miners would be only too glad to get back to work at the earliest opportunity. It is to be hoped that when the inquiry has reported the union will be able to short circuit the procedure and get the answer back to the fields with speed. I hope that at least some of the pits will get back into working order within, say, two months.

Mr. Swain: It could happen tomorrow.

Mr. Skeet: Nobody has today mentioned the question of safety cover in the pits and the fact that many pits will not reopen at all. In other words, the rate of closure will be that much faster. Perhaps the output of the mines will be cut from 140 million tons to 109 million. If


the pits are not reopened it will mean disaster for the industry.
Many people may say that the safety cover promised by the National Union of Mineworkers should have been forthcoming but that the union leaders have no control over their own workers. That may be so. I can only discuss the arguments, because I am not a miner, although I have been down a pit.—[Interruption.] Oh, yes. We know that the mining lobby on the Opposition side numbers about 30 and we expect some enthusiasm from them, but we on this side, if we do not represent the mining interest certainly represent the public interest, and we are determined to see that that public interest is properly represented in the House.
In a letter in The Times of 28th January, 1972, the Chairman of the National Coal Board, Mr. D. J. Ezra, writing from the board's headquarters at Hobart House, stated:
The point is that this roadway and others are now in a very serious condition because remedial help of a kind the N.U.M. leaders instructed their members to give during the strike to keep the pits safe is not being provided.
It was stated last night by the Coal Board that 17 coal faces in 14 collieries will not, because of deteriorating conditions, reopen when the strike ends. I cannot understand the psychology displayed here. It is all very well to indulge in industrial strife for higher pay—and the more that can be paid, within the economy, the better it is—but for men to work themselves into unemployment by letting pits fall in and pressures below to increase so that machinery is trapped and can never be recovered, is most extraordinary behaviour.
I have one or two practical suggestions to make. First, if the Minister were to accelerate the introduction of the normal Summer-time hour we could make greater use of available daylight and so reduce the need for electricity.
Again, if the Minister walks down Millbank he will find Government offices full of light. If the Government want the people to make their contribution at this appropriate moment so as to safeguard electricity supplies, Whitehall should set the example.
Before hon. Members representing mining constituencies get beyond themselves,

I remind them that although their industry has some 280,000 workers there are 50 million people in the country who would like to see the strike ended, who do not like militancy, and who recognise as the true Legislature this House of Commons and not the National Union of Mineworkers.

7.14 p.m.

Mr. Peter Doig: The hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) said that the Labour Government did not treat the miners particularly well. I remind him that the Labour Government delayed the closing of mines, created special development areas, introduced redundancy payments and earnings related supplements as well as taking other steps with miners' interests specially in mind.
I am one of the few hon. Members, possibly the only hon. Member on this side, who believes that the emergency regulations are necessary. I believe that because when the strike started the miners' leaders said that it was their policy to stop all power stations from operating. This has nothing to do with one's views on whether pickets are working unlawfully or not. As I see it, when a union takes its members out on strike it is entitled to picket in order to prevent other people from doing the strikers' jobs. It is also entitled to try to influence other unions to join in. It is quite entitled to try to convince the trade unions that their members in other industries should support it.
What I do not believe is that it is entitled to picket other industries. Whether or not a power station is picketed is something for the power station workers to decide and not for people from outside the area altogether. The miners have no right at all to picket oil-fired power stations without first consulting the other union involved, and it should be for the other union to make the decision—

Mr. Will Griffiths: My hon. Friend has just expressed the view that the miners are not entitled to picket power stations, and so on. I am sure that earlier today he heard the Home Secretary admit that, legally, the miners are entitled to do precisely that.

Mr. Doig: There are many things that should not be done that legally can be done. That is the very point I am making.
We have another departure from past practice. It is common practice when unions members are on strike for them to try to "black", to try to prevent other people from using things produced by others, but what I have never heard of before is for, in this case, the miners to say that the coal they have themselves produced should not be used. This is a new and a dangerous departure. In my opinion the picketing of power stations to prevent them using their stocks of coal is or ought to be unlawful.
That is a highly dangerous precedent. It could lead to other unions saying that the one way to win a strike was to put some key industry out of operation, and the fact that the other industry had no connection or only a slight connection with the dispute apparently did not matter much. It could be that if we had an engineering strike, because the members of the union concerned make the machinery for the power stations they could decide to put the power stations out of operation. This is a highly dangerous precedent to set.
I ask the House to consider the effect of such a practice. In my area I have pensioners, disabled people, unemployed workers and low-paid workers. Those are the people who suffer most, because they cannot afford the alternative. Better off people can hop into their cars, get heat while travelling, go outside the zone affected by the cut, and get a meal at an hotel or restaurant. The people I am speaking of cannot do that.

Mr. Swain: Is not my hon. Friend aware that at this moment the emergency regulations have been brought in because there are only 4 million tons of coal left in stock in the whole country? And that is not because of picketing? Has he realised this?

Mr. Doig: If this is the case—

Mr. Swain: It is.

Mr. Doig: Very well, I am prepared to accept that it may be the case, but if it is the case there is no point in all this picketing, and so on, in respect of all the stocks of coal which the miners themselves have produced.
My next point is that different people are hit in different ways. A great many in my constituency live in all-electric houses. Half of the local authority houses in my area are all-electric, so they lose not only light but also heat. They cannot cook or make a cup of tea.

Mr. Swain: Neither can my constituents.

Mr. Doig: I am not disputing this. It is a fact. I am merely pointing out my conclusions.
I have just read in an evening newspaper that the miners have stopped on oil barge that was taking supplies to an oil-fired power station which almost wholly supplies nothing else but the London underground railway system. Have the miners the right to interfere with the supply of oil to an underground railway which by no stretch of the imagination has any great connection with coal or mining?
It appears to me that thousands of people are already losing their jobs as a result of this action. I am trying to be consistent. Time and again I have argued in the House about high unemployment. I have said that full employment was my first priority. Therefore, I cannot sit back when we already have in Dundee an unemployment figure of 9·8 per cent. The Government will do nothing about that. I am not trying to make excuses for the Government, who have contributed a great deal to all this trouble. But I have to be consistent with those I represent. They want jobs. To a degree, the Government have prevented them from getting jobs. But now it appears that someone else is also preventing them getting jobs or causing thousands who have jobs to lose them. To be consistent, I have to continue to argue my number one priority: full employment for those in my area.
The miners' officials are usurping the power of other trade unions. It also seems that they are challenging democracy because. although we may not like it, the public elected a Conservative Government. A great many of the public have since regretted it, and I have no doubt that they will throw them out at the next General Election. But, nevertheless, it is political action which ought to throw them out.
I am in no way taking sides about the miners' claim. I shall not comment upon whether it is justified. I am criticising the methods used by the miners to achieve their object.

Mr. James Hamilton: As one who is not a miner but, nevertheless, can express a trade union point of view, may I ask my hon. Friend a question. Has not the T.U.C., at top level, stated clearly that it is in full agreement that the picketing should continue and that no other trade union, including mine and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Doig), should break the picket line?

Mr. Doig: I am well aware that my union has said that people should not cross a picket line.

Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Hear, hear.

Mr. Doig: Yes, all right—hear, hear. But let us consider what this means. That picket line could go anywhere. It could be outside the House. Let us realise what this means. If we believe in democracy and do not want anarchy, we should practise what we preach. If we do that, we cannot support—however much we may support their claims on anything else—the methods used by the miners in order to achieve their ends.

7.24 p.m.

Mr. F. A. Burden: Everyone in the House will appreciate the courage and sincerity of the hon. Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Doig). It must have taken considerable courage to have spoken in such a vein, in view of the feelings of many hon. Members opposite. The hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) stated that he hoped that the Daily Telegraph would report him. I hope that the Daily Telegraph will have listened to the hon. Member for Dundee, West.
I take up one or two points mentioned by the hon. Member for Bolsover. He showed clearly in his speech, as a Member for a miners' constituency, complete and absolute intransigence. He also showed that this is a political strike. He made that perfectly clear. He glorified in stating that it was a political strike. He stated emphatically that he was for the workers, for the miners. Who are the workers? Practically everyone in Britain today is a worker, even Members of the

House of Commons. Let us not try to divide the nation on this issue—[Interruption] Hon. Members opposite may laugh, but let us look at the situation. Mining is still a dirty and arduous job. Perhaps to the surprise of some hon. Members opposite, I have been down a mine in South Shields. I deliberately went to see what it was like. It is a dirty and arduous job. But it was just as dirty and arduous when the Labour Party formed the Government, no less so than it is today.
Today hon. Members opposite, especially the miners' Members, are putting forward this argument as the great friends and protagonists of the miners, speaking for them, shouting out for them, and attending the picket lines with them. But what did they do between 1964 and 1969? They did nothing whatsoever. Between the years 1964 and 1969 the number of pits was reduced, under a Labour Government and under a chairman of the Coal Board who was an ex-Labour Cabinet Minister, from 545 to 252.

Mr. Arthur Lewis: The hon. Gentleman means the former Socialists.

Mr. Burden: That was a cut of 293 pits under hon. Gentlemen opposite who are now screaming for the miners' interests. What about manpower? That was cut from 582,000 to about 283,000, a cut of 218,900. Were all those men given jobs? Were they assured of jobs when forced out of the pits that the Labour Government closed?

Mr. Michael McGuire: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Burden: No.

Mr. McGuire: rose—

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. E. L. Mallalieu): Order. There is still a large number of hon. Members who wish to speak. I hope that interruptions will be reduced to a minimum.

Mr. McGuire: rose

Mr. Burden: The hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. John Mendelson), would not give way to me, and I am taking the same line.
It does not look as though the Labour Party were the friends—

Mr. McGuire: rose

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Gillingham (Mr. Burden) is not giving way. The hon. Gentleman should not rise in his place to interrupt.

Mr. McGuire: On a point of order. Mr. Deputy Speaker, I am not one who indulges in this kind of practice. The hon. Gentleman has said, referring particularly to miners' M.P.s, that their voices have been muted in the past and are now vociferous, indicating that we have neglected our miners in the past. I want to rebut that argument.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. That is not a point of order for me. It is a matter for debate.

Mr. Burden: If hon. Members attempted to rebut it, their voices were very muted, and the effect of their voices was nil.
On the question of wage increases, during the whole term of the Labour Government the standard of living of the miners worsened in comparison with other members of the community. When the strike started the position of the miners was as follows. I have the exact figures, because I asked the research department of the Library to look up details of miners' earnings and the cost of living from 1964 to 1970.
The information is dated 9th February and is headed "Research Division, The Library, House of Commons:
The average weekly cash earnings (excluding the value of allowances in kind)"—
that is, coal and in many cases either free or very low-cost houses—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."]—yes—
of National Coal Board miners was £17·97 in the financial year 1964–65 and £27·05 in the financial year 1970–71. This represents an increase of 50·5 per cent over the period.
From October, 1964, to June, 1970, the cost of living rose by 29·2 per cent.
So there was an improvement during that period in the standard of living of the miners of just over 20 per cent.
This is based on the consumer price index"—
this is the index in the cost of living—
for the whole years linked to the Index of Retail Prices for the odd months.
The interesting point is that it was after the Conservative Government came to power that the miners received their biggest wage increase ever, included in the

50·5 per cent. That was an increase of over 12 per cent.
Mining Members opposite said little during the whole of the period that they were in government, and they did nothing effectively to improve the miners' real standard of living. It is humbug and hypocrisy for those who were so muted for so long now to say, "We support an increase of no less than 25 per cent". Do they really believe that it is right and proper that this industry should in two years increase the miners' wages by 37 per cent? If they believe that that is right now, why was it not right when their party were in Government? Why did they take no action to do it then?
There is a very good reason for that and a reason that hon. Members opposite should remember—not a reason given by hon. Members on this side, but a very pertinent reason given by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition who on 24th July, 1967, said this:
If there were devaluation in this country, any effort on the part of the organised workers to counteract it by securing higher wages should be ruthlessly resisted."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th July, 1967; Vol. 751, c. 100.]
Then we had devaluation. Why did we have devaluation? We had devaluation because every other policy that the Labour Government had tried to solve the unemployment position and to put the country on the road to prosperity had failed completely. [Laughter.] Hon. Members opposite laugh a little too early, because I shall give them another quotation. This is from the debate on the economy on 21st November. 1967. when the right hon. Member for Stepney (Mr. Shore) said this:
After three years, trying many different policy approaches, we are forced to choose between a strategy of deflation and unemployment and a strategy of devaluation."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st November, 1967; Vol. 754. c. 1266.]
That was the last card in the pack. The Labour Government had to devalue. They had to devalue to ensure that our goods could sell in world markets. If our goods cannot do that, there is no future for Britain, whether there be a Conservative or a Labour Government. If people are to retain their jobs, the wage increases they can demand depend entirely and absolutely on their ability to produce goods at the right price, at


the right time—God knows, that is being put in jeopardy—and of the right quality to sell in the world markets.
It does not matter whether they are miners, electricity workers, or whatever they are. It finally comes down to that issue. When hon. Members opposite say that the miners should get £7 or £8 a week more, they should think carefully of the long-term results and about whether it will spread costs so heavily through industry that we shall not be competitive in the world's markets.
I wonder whether, if that position should arise, those hon. Members who have been so whole-heartedly in support of everybody getting as much as they can now will be prepared to take the responsibility that will be theirs for encouraging everybody so to do.
Why do not right hon. and hon. Members opposite today look back on those words spoken by their Deputy Leader in July, 1967; for what he said then is as true today as it was in July, 1967. It accounts no doubt for the muted voices of hon. Members in support of the miners during those latter years, because the right hon. Gentleman and his Cabinet colleagues told them that large-scale wage increases could not in any circumstances be allowed.
I believe that it is in the interests of the miners themselves—it is certainly imperative for the future interests of Britain—that they quickly take the amount that has been offered them, which again is greater than any increase they have had before—an increase of £4 for some and £3 for all, plus anything Wilberforce may give. The longer they stay out, the more difficult they make it for this or any other Government to restore full employment, the more difficult they will make it for us to compete in the world's markets, the more certain they will make it that in the long term the position of the miner will become, not more important, but less important and insecure.
We face a great crisis. This is a crisis that takes in not only the miners. This is a crisis facing the whole of Britain. The miners created it; they alone can solve it. It is their duty to do so.

7.39 p.m.

Mr. Brynmor John: I much enjoyed the stroll down memory lane with the hon. Member for Gillingham (Mr. Burden), who produced no

quotation later than five years ago. It is a comment on the utter irrelevance of a debate devoted to the state of emergency being proclaimed by the Government.
I make, in sorrow, one short comment on the contribution of my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Doig). I will not exacerbate feelings which have been aroused by his speech. In one passage of his speech my hon. Friend said, "I am not taking sides on the miners' claim". It was sad to hear my hon. Friend say that, because he knows the part the miners played in founding the Labour Party and in elevating it to power. It is a Labour Party which he and I both share as a label at elections. I never thought that I would hear a Member of the same party say that from these benches. I think that is sufficient comment upon the whole of his speech.
What we are facing, and what my hon. Friend did not face, is this: why have we got to the pitch where a state of emergency exists? It is surely because the Government have been defective in almost elementary competence in the handling of this dispute. The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry said on Friday on the radio and television, "I had not prepared the state of emergency until this morning because I thought that the negotiations were going all right." I understand that the right hon. Gentleman claims to be a business man. What business man, faced with two alternatives, one of which will be successful and one of which will be unsuccessful, does not lay contingency plans for the unsuccessful eventuality?
What lies behind the agonised squeals from hon. Members opposite is that they went into this fight believing that because of changed fuel requirements the miners were indulging in a romatic gesture which could not possibly bring them success. That is why the right hon. Gentleman talked about the miners having to be careful because of oil and nuclear power, and all the veiled threats that he uttered on 18th January. They did not believe the miners would be successful. This is part of the synthetic sympathy as well. But now the real reason for their protesting so vehemently and using exaggerated language is precisely that the miners will be successful.
It has been demonstrated that in our industrial and social life Britain is still overwhelmingly dependent on coal, and it does not suit the Government's book to have found this out. We have the huffing and puffing of hon. Members like the hon. Member for the Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Tugendhat), Sir George Bolton and other "members of the working class" talking about sections of the community holding others to ransom and taking advantage of the economic position in order to force their will on the nation.
I ask the Government Front Bench: what was the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry doing on 18th January except taking advantage of what he thought to be the economic facts of life to dissuade the miners from taking strike action? What were the claims by the Government and the C.E.G.B. about there being plenty of coal stocks available except an attempt to brow-beat the miners into having a settlement or at least not taking strike action? They have used the weapon of taking advantage of the economic situation. But when somebody does it to them, it is unacceptable.
Hon. Members opposite, particularly the hon. Member for the Cities of London and Westminster, seemed to be sad at the prospect of conflict. I thought the Conservative Government had come to power on a policy of conflict. The whole history of their governmental strategy, particularly with reference to the postmen, is based on conflict. It suits them to forget the postmen's strike and the contemptuous way in which they ground the postmen into ignominious defeat. But we remember it. We remember their intransigence when they had the upper hand.
What makes such a pitiful spectacle today is that they do not have the upper hand. If the miners are using their economic position, are they the only ones to use that position for their own ends? What about financiers who sold Britain short during the currency crisis? They sold sterling in large amounts in order to cut their losses, with no thought of the damage that they would do to the country and no thought of the consequences of devaluation. They used their position to protect their own interests.

They were not called wreckers and saboteurs by hon. Members opposite. Why, I wonder? What about doctors who have habitually been able to impose their will on the rest of the country? We have heard of the latest 30 per cent. wage increase; what is that but an exploitation of a monopoly position?
What about the C.B.I.? My right hon. Friend the Member for Fulham (Mr. Michael Stewart) mentioned the but he did not mention an example which highlights the position concerning the C.B.I. On the tape today, there is an announcement that the Director-General of the C.B.I. has said that the continuance of the C.B.I. policy of price restraint will depend on how much the Chancellor gives them in the next Budget. In other words, unless he bribes them well enough, their policy of price restraint will go to the wall. What is that except holding the country to ransom? Yet hon. Members opposite do not mention the subject. They have this double standard. They talk easily about sections of the community, with whom they pretend to sympathise, holding the country to ransom. They talk not at all of people who do so more flagrantly in their turn.
It has been said that democratic government is at stake. I thought the Secretary of State said that the Government have no part in this quarrel, that it is between the N.C.B. and the N.U.M. It is only because the Government believed that the miners were going to be beaten that they took the attitude they did. They saw no reason to hurry or to become deeply involved so long as they believed that the miners' strike was an irrelevance which could be brushed aside and not noticed by the country. They badly miscalculated the fuel needs of the country and the mood of the people in the country.
Members from mining constituencies—and I am proud to be one—do not live in a world which is different from that in which hon. Members opposite live. They have disabled people and pensioners in their constituencies. In fact, hon. Members from mining constituencies and working-class backgrounds have parents who depend on the State pension. We know the problems of the pensioner. But the provision of finance for pensioners is a problem for the Government. If the miners were to be


beaten, it would not make any difference to the pensioner or the disabled. The plight of the pensioner is not mentioned when the C.B.I. discusses the return from investment before considering further investment in the economy. We have had no preparation, no phasing and no discussion precisely because the miners were thought by the Government to be on a weak wicket on which they would lose.
The Government and their Front Bench spokesmen have shown themselves up in a most unfortunate light. They have acted with an equal measure of arrogance and ignorance, and they are left with the ashes of their policy around them—the ashes of their policy which by the declaration of a state of emergency they wished to salvage. I believe that on this occasion it is right, in the national interest and in the interest of millions of ordinary people, that we should vote against the declaration of a state of emergency and, notwithstanding the reluctance of some others, I shall be proud to do so.

7.48 p.m.

Mr. John Stokes: The hon. Member for Pontypridd (Mr. John) mentioned millions of ordinary people. It is quite right that in this debate we should have those people in the forefront of our minds, because that is what this debate is all about—the fate of the 50 million people who live in these islands.
I represent an industrial constituency in the Midlands, in the heart of England, containing thousands of car, chemical, engineering and metal workers, many of them today going on short time with the possibility of a total close down within the next two weeks. I therefore regard this debate as a most serious matter.
I am sure that most hon. Members are anxious not to exacerbate the situation but to do what they can to improve matters. The miners have much sympathy. I do not think, however, that in this debate we are concerned primarily with the exact terms of any pay settlement, provided that we see justice done both to the miners and to the nation as a whole.
The miners have received an improved pay offer. There is a court of inquiry sitting today to examine the whole matter justly and impartially. Many people,

like those I met in the pubs and clubs last Saturday night, believe that the miners should now go back and play fair with the country. Surely, the miners' leaders will think again before committing the country to immense damage, and, incidentally, damage to their own industry as well. We know that the miners are tough and brave, but so is the whole British nation. If the miners persist in their strike, they will, I believe, find increasing opposition to their case from more and more sections of the British public. In the end, public opinion always wins, just as it did in the power dispute at the end of 1970.
What a time this is to have such troubles. Everyone knows that recovery was due to start. [Laughter.] Everyone was hoping for a decrease in unemployment in the next few weeks. It is not a laughing matter. Everyone wanted the economy and our trade to be as strong as possible before we enter the Common Market this time next year. Yet all these hopes will be dashed if the strike continues. The damage it does is cumulative. Miners and their families are consumers, too. Even if the strike were to stop tonight, it would take weeks for things to get back to normal.
I believe that the British people will not give way. A nation that survived the war and all the threats then is unlikely to give way to a threat from 280,000 miners. I know that there is great loyalty in the working class from union to union. Working-class solidarity is an important fact of life today, as it has been for a long time. But I think—I know what I am talking about—the working class have a loyalty also to the nation even stronger than their loyalty to the different unions.
I wish to make three other points, and I emphasise that I speak in no hostility to the miners. First, miners' families are being cushioned from the worst effects of the strike by the State benefits which they receive, benefits which we all pay for out of taxation.

Mr. Leslie Huckfield: So do the miners.

Mr. Stokes: It would be contrary to human nature to expect these payments not to be questioned, and I am certain that some changes will have to be made in this respect. We are told that already


a sum of no less than £2 million has been paid out to miners' families. Some people feel that there could be a better use for that money.
Second, there is the picketing. I believe that the suddenness of the crisis was not, as some hon. Members have contended, caused by any failure on the part of the Government but was caused by the totally unexpected success of illegal picketing. We have seen a lot of picketing on television.

Mr. John: rose—

Mr. Stokes: No, I want to get on. I believe that the mass of the miners are good men, but it is plain that in many cases picketing has gone beyond the legitimate stage. Very often, it is not miners but outsiders, students and subversive elements, who have been responsible for some of the trouble. This illegal picketing has been the main cause of the substantial disruption of supplies to the power stations, and in my view, and the view of the majority of the nation, it must be brought to an end.
Until today, the most serious episode was the closing of the big coke depôt in Birmingham. I spoke to the chief constable of Birmingham today, and he told me—he wants to make this clear—that the decision to close the depôt was his and his alone, and it was brought about by the large numbers of people outside the gates, many of them not miners but engineering workers on a one-day strike, so that, with the police available to him, order could not be kept without risk of serious disturbance.
The chief constable intended to have the depôt closed for only one day, and I do not blame him for his action in the circumstances in which he found himself. But the arrangement has continued, and what worries me and many people in the country is that ordinary drivers on their lawful occasions are now not able to enter the depôt. This is nothing less than mob rule. I have written to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary about it. We must insist that the depôt be opened again.
A second equally serious incident happened today when pickets in the West Country tried to stop the unloading of a coaster carrying coal. We live by imports. If imports into Britain can be stopped by

illegal picketing, the nation can be brought to its knees in a matter of days. [An HON. MEMBER: "It is not illegal."] If there are not enough police available, the Government have a duty to consider the use of troops. If, as I am told is possible, we now have few troops available in this country because of events in Northern Ireland and so on, consideration must be given to bringing some units back from Germany, and also to the Territorial Army being called up.
I hope that hon. Members on the Opposition benches will not cheer too loudly tonight at the victories which illegal picketing has had. They are not victories of which the House of Commons can be proud, for they are victories of illegality, and once illegality is allowed to triumph, in this House or anywhere else, who knows where it will end?
We are ruled by the Queen in Parliament. which means, in effect, by the decisions taken in this Chamber. We cannot surrender that sovereignty to any other body, powerful trade union or whatever it may be. Are we to continue to be a peaceful, law-abiding and sensible nation, or have we taken leave of our senses? We know that civilisation is but a veneer and we all have the savage beneath us. I believe that the mass of ordinary people want this violence rooted out. After all, it is they who would suffer most if we went further down the slippery slope towards anarchy.
I appeal to all those in positions of influence to use their authority to counsel moderation. Above all, the Government must show firmness and resolution. Sir Robert Peel used to say that people like to feel that they are being governed. If the Government give the right leadership, the great majority of the nation, I am certain, will follow, and we shall by that means overcome this most serious crisis.

8.0 p.m.

Mr. Leslie Huckfield: I shall find it difficult to follow the hon. Member for Oldbury and Halesowen (Mr. Stokes) into the crisis atmosphere he has tried to portray. I suspect that he is deliberately painting the most lurid and vivid picture he can of illegal picketing, because that is the Government's tactics. The more they can make pickets appear to be violent, the more they can


say that pickets are doing all sorts of illegal things, the more it suits their purposes, because they can shift the blame from themselves, where it really belongs.
The most revealing insight into the Government's attitude was the Prime Minister's speech in Liverpool last Friday when he said that mining was an unpleasant occupation. He was speaking of an industry in which some 92 men were killed last year and which has about 40,000 men suffering from pneumoconiosis. If the Prime Minister thinks only that it is an unpleasant industry, perhaps that is a reflection of the scale of values that he and the Government have.
The Government, particularly the Treasury Front Bench, are absolutely paranoid about working-class feeling. They are incapable of understanding that throughout the country—in Warwickshire, whose miners I represent, Yorkshire, Scotland and South Wales—there are miners who would rather see their pits cave in and close down than return to work on the Coal Board's terms. That is the kind of feeling right hon. and hon. Members opposite who have spoken seem to be totally incapable of understanding.
The Government have dawdled along in their handling of the crisis. It is a crisis now, thanks to their dawdling. They have to look for a scapegoat, and that is why we have the continued harping upon the alleged violence of the pickets and their tactics. What do Conservative hon. Members expect pickets to do but picket? That is why they are there, to stop their trade union brethren crossing the picket line. That is what picketing is all about. We have had picketing situations before. Do not Conservative hon. Members understand them? I suspect that by continually harping on about pickets they are trying once more to shift the blame from themselves.
If we want to understand something of the ignorance of some Conservative hon. Members, we have only to listen to some of the sentiments expressed from the Government benches today. It has even been alleged by some hon. Members opposite that miners live rent free. I wish that Warwickshire miners lived rent free. There may be a few living rent free in Durham who happen to live in rather older Coal Board houses. But if

Conservative Members' ignorance of the mining situation is so complete that they really think miners live rent free, that is one more indication of how the incredible gap between the Treasury Front Bench and the facts about how miners really feel and work is growing every minute.

Mr. Arthur Lewis: There are people who live rent free, and they are on the Government Front Bench. Not only do they live rent free, but they get their heat, coal, light, cars—everything except the clothes that they have to purchase out of their large salaries, which some of them have doubled over the past year.

Mr. Huckfield: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his intervention. He knows how strongly I feel about this myself.
The country has never been more socially divided. We have in power a Government deliberately trying to create two nations, with things like the so-called fair rent legislation and the introduction of their emergency powers now. It is two nations that the Prime Minister wants, and that attitude has been echoed in several speeches by hon. Members opposite today. The hon. Member for Oldbury and Halesowen spoke about a situation of anarchy on the horizon. It has even been alleged that the National Union of Mineworkers was supposed to be in some mystical and mythical way taking over the running of the country. But it was the Executive of the Transport and General Workers Union that decided its policy would be that its members should not cross picket lines. It was the Executive of the National Union of Railwaymen and the executives of other unions that decided that their unions would support the strike. Those decisions were arrived at not through the dictatorship of the N.U.M. but through the democratic procedures of the unions concerned.
Any picketing that is successful is now called intimidation. If pickets just stand harmlessly and aimlessly by the roadside and do not talk to anyone, that is called peaceful picketing. But if they are successful in turning round a few lorries that is intimidation, in the definition of Conservative Members.
I should like to say a little about the intimidation in Birmingham last week. I


was on the picket lines at Saltley. Lorry drivers were telling us time and time again that if they did not get a load out of Saltley they would get the sack when they returned. We were told time and time again by other members of the Transport and General Workers Union, also on the picket line, that lorry drivers had been bribed by their employers to get loads of coke out of Saltley. When a driver is told that unless he returns with a load he will get the sack, I call that intimidation. I call that an illegal practice. Those are the kind of things we have not heard about from Conservative Members. I also call the kind of speech we heard from the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Tugendhat) intimidation. To accuse miners of holding the country to ransom in the way he did is intimidating conduct.
I should like to give a few further examples of the kind of thing I saw in Saltley last week. One picket was arrested for eating a sandwich. He was told that he was carrying a piece of paving stone. He had it in his hand at the time—and produced it to me after being released on bail—a packet of sandwiches.

Mr. Stokes: Perhaps they were stale.

Mr. Huckfield: I do not know what sandwiches the hon. Gentleman is used to, but these were pretty good sandwiches as far as I could see.
There was a case of the attempted arrest of a union official just as he was going to talk to a policeman. The policeman told him that he was about to be arrested, until it became a little more clear who he was.
There was also the case of the cut lips and the bruises of the pickets who had to be carted off to hospital, not because they had been engaged in altercations with lorry drivers or their fellow members but because they had been engaged in altercations that the police themselves were not too happy to explain. Those are the kind of things that happened on the picket lines at Saltley last week.
Feelings were engendered in the miners when they could see that while the police were capable of picking on them they were not capable of picking on the lorry drivers who came without road fund licences on their vehicles, the lorry drivers

who came in with bald tyres, the lorry drivers who came in with polluting and smoking exhausts. While it was quite permissible for the police to pick on a man for arguing with a lorry driver, a driver who arrived with no road tax in sight went in scot-free. That is the kind of feeling the hon. Gentleman would do well to bear in mind when he talks about picketing in future.
Throughout last week a solution was available at Saltley. The N.U.M. pickets were prepared to operate the kind of priority even the Minister's Department did not appear to know anything about. When I telephoned the Chairman of the West Midlands Gas Board last Tuesday when I was in Birmingham he told me that as far as he was concerned it was business as normal. If he thinks it is "business as usual" with 500 policemen and 1,500 pickets outside his gates, his scale of values is very different from mine. The Department and the Gas Board were very confused and upset, and were certainly not aware of the agreements and procedures that were working very successfully in other parts of the country. We have heard references even from the Home Secretary, when for that short period today, he came out of hibernation, to the fact that plans had been prepared. But one need only look into electricity showrooms to see the multicoloured diagrams showing one's own area and when one will be affected to realise that such diagrams must have been prepared weeks ago.
Are we now suddenly to be told that the situation has reached such a crisis atmosphere that the Government have had to conjure up these emergency powers? No. The truth is that the Government have kept back these emergency powers until the last possible moment hoping, by the delay, to turn public sympathy away from the miners' case. The result is chaos in industry and for the domestic consumers—and it was all in the cause of shifting the blame away from the Government.
If the Government really want to do something about some of the special cases about which we have heard some mightily extravagant pleading today, they should look into the cases where coal merchants are putting up their prices to old-age pensioners. We know that coal for pensioners is coming from the pits;


it is being allowed to move by the union pickets, who are deliberately giving priority to it. So why, therefore, do not the Government look into the case after case after case, which I am sure all hon. Members on this side of the House must be receiving, where merchants are deliberately increasing the price of coal to pensioners? This is the kind of thing the Government should be looking into instead of bellyaching about pickets.
Finally, having been on the picket lines and having seen the behaviour of the police myself, I suggest that the Government would do well to look at their behaviour and not put all the blame for the belated introduction of these emergency powers on to the pickets. The pickets are using the only peaceful means they know of talking to lorry drivers and other people—if they are allowed to get close by the police, that is—because it is the only way they can put their case. The Government and the country should not blame the pickets or the miners at large, for the situation is not their fault. The situation is the fault of the most insincere, intransigent and insensitive Government we have had this century.

8.13 p.m.

Mr. A. G. F. Hall-Davis: I hope to touch on some of the points raised by the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Leslie Huckfield), and I begin by taking up his reference to two nations. I believe that there is a danger of the creation of two nations in this country, and it is a danger to which hon. Members on both sides have contributed and are contributing. The two nations which I see developing—and the situation worries me—are the nation of those still in active employment, with an average wage in manufacturing industry of £30 a week, and that of the retired, who are living on pensions, sometimes supplemented by savings.
In all our discussions of this modern society of ours, the people with whom I am most concerned in justice are those who are not in a position to exercise any of the bargaining power we are discussing. I recognise, in fairness, that the hon. Gentleman also referred to their problems, but I believe that it is unrealistic to suggest that there is a two-nation gap between those who are in employment, whatever their position may be. On the

contrary, managing director and shop floor worker have far more in common with each other than with the man who is retired.
I believe that few major industrial disputes end in victory for either side. That is especially true in contracting industries, of which I have, unhappily, some long experience, having lived and worked, before I came to this House, in the centre of a textile and coal mining area. I believe that, as a result of the course that the present dispute has taken, the miners will be worse off both in the short and in the longer term.
One of the skills in the conduct of industrial negotiations is to know when to settle, but one of the responsibilities of those who are not directly involved in those negotiations is to do nothing which makes it more difficult for the negotiators to settle when their judgment tells them that they should. Whilst accusations fly backwards and forwards across the Floor of this House about the motives of both Government and Opposition, I am afraid it is true to say that our debates have made it more difficult for those conducting the negotiations to follow their judgment when they felt that the time had come when they should settle. The debates have certainly not eased their task.
I believe that there are two matters about the present dispute which are not in doubt. The first is that the miners have the power to bring the economy to a halt. That is self-evident. There may have been a difference of view about how long it would take, but no one can doubt that the miners have that power and will have it for many years to come. Although I had not intended to refer to picketing, because I believe that it is to some extent incidental to the situation in which we find ourselves, in view of what has been said it is fair that I should point out my belief that we would be unwise not to recognise that a new situation has developed as a result of the picketing in this dispute, largely as a result of the more mobile society in which we live, which has brought us so many other new developments in other directions.
The second factor which is not in doubt, although little reference has been made to it so far, is that the National Coal


Board could at any time have settled had it been prepared to ignore the consequences for the future size and employment prospects of the coal industry. Hon. Members opposite have accused the Government of restraining the board from making a higher offer. I believe that it was the experience of the coal industry in recent years—a steady, almost remorseless, run down and a fight by management and others to achieve stability of production, sales and employment—which was at the back of the board's reluctance to increase its offer. Its attitude was not based on pressure from the Government but on the wish to avoid further contraction in the industry. I do not believe that the Government should have pressed the board to make an offer which the board itself would have considered to be against the industry's prospects.
The board felt and still feels that an increased offer would be against the industry's prospects, because it would inevitably put up the price of coal. We all deplore the interruption to production which is taking place, but if one gets the perspective right it is far less an evil to have an interruption to production which we hope will be short-lived and much of which can be made good later, than to let loose rampant inflation with all its effects on employment and on the elderly and retired.
Let us look at the Government's action and examine the course they have followed. When last week the Government saw a prospect of a settlement, they brought the parties together. The result was an increased offer from the National Coal Board, which the N.U.M. President is reported to have said he would have accepted five weeks ago. But how did he react when the offer was made—not over the weekend, but at the time the offer was made? Did he say, "It was good enough once but is not good enough now. Let us see whether we can come to terms"? No, he did not say that. As I understand the position, he lodged a counter-claim which he said was not negotiable and which must have damaged the industry very severely and restarted a vicious inflation.
After this response, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment acted again. He announced a court of inquiry under the chairmanship of

somebody whose impartiality was in no way questioned and, furthermore, he prevailed on the N.C.B. to undertake to implement its last and increased offer immediately and to agree to accept the inquiry's recommendation. I believe that this is the most any Minister of any Government could possibly have done. Because this move was rejected, these emergency regulations have been brought in with a degree of acuteness.
Hon. Members opposite have made much of the fact that the Government wished to turn public opinion against the miners.

Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Hear, hear.

Mr. Hall-Davis: If the Government had wished to turn public opinion against the miners, it would have brought in the emergency regulations and announced the consequences to employment before the Secretary of State had set up his inquiry and had persuaded the N.C.B. to implement its offer immediately and to agree to any enhanced recommendation should that be forthcoming.
If one looks at the course of events, it does not hold water to accuse the Government of trying to whip up public opinion against the mineworkers. The mineworkers have secured everything they could reasonably hope to expect now that the Government have introduced their offer.

Mr. Kinnock: May I tell the hon. Gentleman what the N.U.M. has said to the Government? They want cash.

Mr. Hall-Davis: I have great respect for the hon. Member's contribution to our debate and perhaps I could close on this note. Let us look at the present situation. We must view the present statements of the union against its own President's statement that the offer now on the table would have been acceptable five weeks ago. We must view it in the light of the N.C.B.'s undertaking and expressed willingness to pay its last increased offer immediately and to improve it if the inquiry so recommends.
The question I wish to put is this: do the miners think they will have any sympathy from the public if they reject the findings of the inquiry and continue strike action, with the consequences on the economy and on employment generally which we are now seeing? Whatever


we feel about where sympathy has resided so far, I do not believe that when the inquiry reports, and if it is rejected by the N.U.M. and the strike continues, there will be any sympathy continuing for the mineworkers.
It is reasonable to ask the N.U.M. to consider whether it is feasible to go on talking about the strike continuing if it finds the inquiry's recommendations unacceptable. If it is not feasible to go on talking that way, is there any reason for continuing strike action while the inquiry is sitting, and inflicting the present hardship and disruption both on people in industry and people in their homes?
Only time will tell who will be the victor in this dispute or whether there will be a victor at all. But if after the decision to set up an inquiry, and if after the board's commitment to accept the inquiry's recommendations, the strike still continues, I am sure the whole nation, miners and pensioners alike, will be the losers. I hope the mineworkers will look at the situation in that light and will take steps to secure an immediate return to work on the basis of the assurance given that the recommendations of the inquiry will be implemented by the N.C.B.

8.24 p.m.

Mr. Neil Kinnock: I should like to try to answer the question put by the hon. Member for Morecambe and Lonsdale (Mr. Hall-Davis). He asked whether we thought that public sympathy would continue for the miners in the event of their turning down the judgment of the court of inquiry. If the offer is not held by the men, who have been out for over five weeks, to be adequate compensation for their work, for the sacrifices which they have made over past years and for the effort they have made during the strike, if they feel that it is merely to be the insult of the original offer, then they will not be considering matters of public sympathy. They will simply be saying "No" to whatever is the offer.
Their main campaign is not in the first instance for public sympathy. If that had been the case then, realising the grave responsibility of the coal industry, they would not have come out on strike. They are out on strike to secure a just

wage for people in the industry. The Government are trying to use public opinion like a sledge hammer with which to beat the miners, as they tried to do against the postmen and the power workers. It will not work with the miners. I hope that this debate has convinced the Government of what their own adviser could not convince them: that this body of 280,000 men do not stand alone. They are men who, by technological definition, are in groups and communities. They have their wives and dependants 100 per cent. behind them. The Government have taken on a community of people in the valleys of South Wales, in Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, Scotland and the rest of the country which is more capable of withstanding the Government, and indeed the Press, than any isolated group of workers in any other walk of life, with the possible exception of the dockers. That is the situation, and that is what the Government have to recognise.
We have been told today that there are 280,000 men in the industry who are holding the country to ransom. That is a gross error. It is an exaggeration of about 279,900. The 100 or so men who are holding the country to ransom are the Government. It is not a matter of the miners taking it upon themselves to go on strike. I have never met a striker in any industry at any time who wanted to go on strike. I have never seen happiness on the faces of delegates at branch meetings when putting up their hands in favour of a strike. People do not want to strike. But if any group of men was ever driven to and scourged into standing up and saying, "We have had enough", it is the miners of Great Britain.
We have a situation not where the miners are holding the country to ransom but where the Government, through their intransigence and insularity, have put the country into a situation of economic and industrial disaster. That is the price that we have to pay for a Government who are totally alienated from the feelings and aspirations of the workers. The 28 days of almost totalitarian rule that the emergency regulations permit is another price that this country must pay for a Government who are incapable of handling the problems of democracy.
The problems of free collective bargaining are problems with which this


Government are not qualified to deal. Three times since June, 1970, right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite have had to resort to the last blunt weapon of the emergency regulations. When the welfare of the nation is threatened, obviously it is necessary for the Government to take extraordinary powers. When it happens three times, with the whole country divided, with a million on the dole and in an industry which is renowned for its passiveness and, in industrial relations terms, its loyalty and so-called responsibility, the Government must question the wisdom of the course that they are following.
In the last six weeks, the Cabinet Room has been so isolated from public opinion, from public feelings and even more from the strongly-held and deep-seated beliefs expressed on the picket line that it has been like an isolation ward at the time of a plague. It is the function of Government to understand what ordinary people are saying and what the participants in a national issue are doing. It would have taken only a morning of any Minister's time to talk to pickets in any part of the country and to understand exactly what the nature of this struggle was.
It is not just about pay, though pay is the straw which broke the camel's back. It is also about the pay that the miners have not had. It is about the postponements and the threats of closures if they pursued pay claims in the past. They say that they have had enough. It is also about pit closures that have occurred, and the resultant decay of communities. Again they are saying that they have had enough. It is about the kind of nationalisation that they have seen which makes them say that they do not want the same old private enterprise team wearing different jerseys.
These political opinions are being arrived at on picket lines where, five weeks ago, as Mr. Gormley said last week, the possibility is that, if last week's offer had been made and if it had covered a 12-month period, it might have been accepted. But it has come on top of the history of coal mining in the last 25 years, with its wage, industrial and social pressures, including terrible pressures of insecurity. The insult of the board's offer and the final specious offer of last week,

the withdrawal of the offer by the board on the eve of the strike, and Derek Ezra's totally insular attitude have all combined to make the strike a hard and well-defined struggle between people who presume to derive their livings from owning money and those who derive their livings from earning money in society.
Any commentator in the future will look at this strike as a monumental struggle between people in what has been held to be a dying industry and those who refuse to listen to them. It is a watershed in British political history, in that, in the midst of affluence and what we have presumed to be public apathy about the great issues, we have found a nation of dormant democrats, people who when faced with issues say, "We have had enough. Now we stand on our own feet and challenge whoever comes along. We are determined to get what we have asked for: the undertakings, the security, and the assurances to give ourselves and our families decent lives in the community and the industry that we know. We are determined to see these things come about." In miscalculating that aspect, the Government have probably made a mortal mistake.
Hon. Gentlemen opposite have talked about the old-age pensioners. Do they imagine that we have not got old-age pensioners? We have more than our share of old-age pensioners. Due to the rundown of the industry we have more than our share of the chronic sick, the bronchial asthmatics and pneumoconiotics.
What have the old-age pensioners done? The old-age pensioners of South Wales sent their president to the miners' platform to say, "We stand with the miners." We know that the old-age pensioners know that we will never get a square deal until there is a victory for the working-class in this country, because nobody else will give us, as old-age pensioners, the money we require. The old-age pensioners send their postal orders of 25p to N.U.M. headquarters and run raffles to help the miners. The reason is that the old-age pensioners about whom we are talking are not acquisitive. They understand the co-operative spirit. They have lived and do live in the mining communities and they want to make a contribution to this struggle because they know that it is their struggle, too.
There should be a Minister in the Government who can stand up and speak in realistic terms about the dispute. somebody in the Government should know what is going on. It is incredible that we should have a society which is so divided, where communications between sections of our society are so tenuous, that the Government do not know what is going on. If they do, then perhaps that is an even more insidious aspect of the whole problem. If the Government knew the depth of feeling, if they knew how far the miners were prepared to go, if they knew what the miners really wanted and did nothing about it, that puts a brand new light on the problems. If that is the situation, the Government are not fools; they are knaves. They are not idiots, as properly and widely supposed; their posture is a calculated posture. It means that they intended their intransigence and that they intended to let the miners stew. Instead, the miners boiled. Instead of taking things as they came and waiting the 11 weeks which the coal stocks were supposed to last, they asserted their democratic right and picketed.
Hon Gentlemen opposite have bemoaned picketing. If they had been on strike for five weeks, if their families' total income was £7 a week social security benefit, if they were worried about smoking their next cigarette, if they were worried about paying the rent, and they saw some cowboy coming along driving a bald-tyred wagon without a road fund licence, what would their reaction be? What would be the instinct of any red-blooded man in this House, having put his family to all that inconvenience and near misery, if he saw someone riding roughshod over his picket line? I know what my attitude would be. In fact, I should be worried if it were not the case.
There are 280,000 miners on strike; there are hundreds, possibly thousands, on picket sites all over the country. I have visited some in my constituency and nearby during the last three or four weeks. There is no trouble there. The reason is that this is one section of the working class working in alliance with another section. The lorry drivers of South Wales do not drive across the picket lines. That is why there has been no disturbance. They do not desist be

cause they are afraid of the miners. They recognise that the miners' struggle is justified because of the deal which they have had and because they can be closely identified with it as fellow wage-earners.
Why is it that we do not have trouble in South Wales but there is trouble in Birmingham? It is because the employers in those regions where they has been trouble are stupid enough to try to bribe those people who will always take money, those for whom there is always a price, to cross the picket lines with lorries and boats of dubious origin. If that is the way they want to fight, that is the way the miners are prepared to fight. Let no one make a mistake. It requires two to make a fight. There has not been an instance in which the miners have instigated a fight, because they are peculiarly aware of the sensitivity of public opinion. The last thing they will do is by appearing to be militants, to throw away the fund of good will which they have built up.
Let us remember that there are two parties to every fight. As some of my hon. Friends have said, in some cases there are three parties—strike breakers, scabs, yellow dogs, all the names we know, the miners and the police. But now we have a fourth factor entering into it—it has been there in the background all the time—the State.
In a democracy it is function of the State to hold a balance, to ensure fairness, yet every contribution from the Treasury Bench, and especially last Friday's statement and the contribution made by the Secretary of State for Employment last week in the debate, has been extremely partisan and a one-sided representation, or misrepresentation, of the facts relating to the coal mining industry. The Government have made it plain on whose side they stand. We on this side of the House are making it clear on which side we stand.
Added to all the frustration, disgust and desperation of the miners there is one element that is making the situation even more grim. That is the fury that is starting to beset the miners, resulting particularly from the speech of the Prime Minister last Friday. What has become apparent is that in the last five, six, or ten weeks, since early December last year, there has been a kind of political pantomine, with the Prime Minister acting as


stage manager, the Home Secretary as the front end of the horse and the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry as the back end of it.
The Government were going to leave the miners and the N.C.B. to fight it out. The Government's view was, "It is none of our business. This is not the time to intervene". Last week, however, was a busy one. Emergency measures were introduced. A court of inquiry was set up. The final blow came on Friday with hard, tight emergency measures which will crack down on productive capacity.
It is too much of a coincidence for the miners, or anyone of intelligence, to accept that after five weeks of strike, after weeks before that of go-slow and work-to-rule, all of a sudden, overnight as it were, the Government stumbled across the situation in which the power industry finds itself. Nobody of any sense can believe that it is not a calculated posture and the conscious development of a policy designed eventually to bring the Prime Minister in as Prince Charming to crush the miners with the force of public opinion as a pantomine finale.
The Government say to the miners, "A court of inquiry has been set up. Why not go back to work?" Last week a spurious offer was made to the miners by the N.C.B. at the instigation of the Secretary of State for Employment. The Government knew that the miners would not accept it. No miner in his right mind would. The miners are told by the Prime Minister that they have nothing to lose by going back to work, but they know that by going back they will lose the only weapon they have, that of being able to say to the country, "Until we get a fair settlement we are not going back". They have gone back too often in the past, and it is not going to happen this time.

8.43 p.m.

Mr. David Crouch: I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lonsdale (Mr. Hall-Davis) that the hon. Member for Bedwellty (Mr. Kinnock) makes a valuable contribution to our debates. He speaks with the fervour of a new Member, and that is a great advantage, because this House sometimes has the effect of dulling a Member's spirit. There has been no

dulling of the hon. Gentleman's spirit. He speaks feelingly of the miners whom he represents and understands. He understands the miners' case, but I think that in his fervour he has perhaps forgotten a point which has been sought to be made by many of my hon. Friends on this side of the House, namely, that there is another side of the nation's interest about which we are worried. It is called the public interest. That is not derided by anyone.
The hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) suggested that he was concerned only about the miners. I do not mind his being concerned about them. I do not mind his speaking with as much fervour as anyone on the subject for those whom he feels need a fair deal. But we must all remember that the Government have been seeking to follow a policy which they believe is right. That is a policy of checking inflation, a disease which has gripped this country for many years. All of us, whatever our political opinions, must respect the determination of a Government anxious to try to achieve that aim which will help the community, even broad sections of the community who have other aims such as the miners.
I am perhaps the last back-bench speaker tonight. I have spoken twice in these coal debates. I am disappointed to see not the emptiness of the House but the emptiness of the Front Benches when the nation is in a state of emergency. I make no excuse for criticising my Front Bench for not supporting the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry in greater strength than at the moment and than it has done for the last two or three hours.
One would hardly think, looking at the House of Commons, that we were in a state of emergency. We are not debating the coal miners' strike; we are debating a state of emergency in the nation when factories of every industry are closing down and people being thrown out of work and suffering. [Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Derbyshire, North-East (Mr. Swain) would not interrupt me from the fully reclined position I would appreciate it. I have a respect for the hon. Gentleman. He has interrupted me every time I have spoken, although I do not think he disagrees with what I say.
I listened to the valuable contribution of the right hon. Member for Leeds, West


(Mr. C. Pannell). He does not often speak in the House about trade union or industrial disputes. He speaks to us usually about the procedure of this House or constitutional matters. I know, because I once fought him in Leeds, West, that when he feels that something is at stake for the country and for this House he catches the eye of the Chair, with advantage to the whole House, as he proved today. I thank him for it. While he criticised my Government, he tried to bring some sense into the argument that has been raging for the last five or six weeks.
I am afraid that I may not be doing myself much good by what I am about to say. I believe that this present state of emergency has been brought about by incompetence on all sides. It has been brought about, as I have said in two previous speeches, by incompetence on the part of the Coal Board management—incompetence because the Chairman of the Coal Board did not achieve the independence which the chairman of a nationalised industry should achieve.
He should not take the job unless he is prepared to run that industry properly, and by that I mean with the true interests of the people who work for him and the true interests of the nation at heart. He has to make the industry profitable. Another interest with which he has to concern himself is the social interest. An industry which is on the decline, as we all accept, can decline only at a socially acceptable rate.
This is a triple responsibility, and I believe that the Chairman of the Board and his team must accept and demand an independence so that they can manage the industry. They cannot manage if the Government are constantly looking over their shoulders.
There is, and has been in the last few weeks, an incompetence in the leadership of the National Union of Mineworkers. I do not deny that the miners have a good case and have pleaded it with sincerity. They have fumbled it on occasions. I believe that with good management in the Board and the union this strike need never have happened. If the Coal Board Chairman had succeeded in being independent of the Government, as he should have been, he would have been more able to identify himself with the industry he has served for 25 years. I

believe that he knows his industry; of course he does—and I know that the miners respect him.

Mr. Ron Lewis: The hon. Member said that the Chairman of the National Coal Board has proved himself to be not up to the mark. Does he agree that it is time he was given a free transfer?

Mr. Crouch: I have not said that the Chairman was not up to the mark; I said that we have a situation in which the Chairman has not been as free as he should have been, and therefore not as strong as he should have been. I could not see this situation arising under the chairmanship of Lord Robens. Although he occasionally ran up against the union he was able to carry union opinion with him and, at the same time, carry his opinion right into the Cabinet. He had achieved the type of leadership that we need in nationalised industries, namely, a leadership with charisma and a determination to serve both his industry and the community.
Some incompetence has also been shown by the Government, in their argument that they could leave it to the Coal Board when they knew that they were not leaving it to the Coal Board. This strike need not have occurred. After two offers from the Coal Board we now have the Wilberforce court of inquiry. If only we could have faced this problem six weeks ago; if only we could have dealt with it as I suggested in my speech of 18th January, by negotiation, instead of debating the matter in Parliament and setting up a court of inquiry. If only we could have proceeded by way of continuing negotiation.
I am concerned that although Parliament has twice debated this great dispute between a trade union and its management—the Coal Board—nothing has been done. Speeches have been made by hon. Members on both sides of the House; hon. Members have made what they regard as reasoned and fair contributions-and nobody has taken any notice of what they have said. What is the point of Parliament's making a contribution? What is the point of any back bencher making a speech—whether it be the hon. Member for Bolsover, the hon. Member for Derbyshire, North-East or myself—if there is no reaction right the way up


to the Cabinet, nobody saying, "Parliament is concerned; Members are concerned; the people's representatives are concerned. Let us think about it. Let us call them in and talk to them. Perhaps they are indentified with the interests of the miners and have something to say".
We are in a state of emergency; that is what worries me. I am not speaking in a coal miners' debate; I am speaking in a debate dealing with a state of emergency in Britain.
After our debate on 8th February, when the House was in a cool temper, hon. Members on both sides appealed for calm in the country and for the Secretary of State for Employment to continue negotiations with the N.C.B. and the N.U.M. Hon. Members appealed to them all to keep talking. I am sorry that it was not my right hon. Friend who walked out and it was not Mr. Ezra who walked out; it was Joe Gormley who walked out. The appeal went out from this House for those talks to continue. We did not want this state of emergency but we now have it because Joe Gormley felt that he had to walk out. The arithmetic of the matter did not appeal to him.

Mr. Harold Lever: It is not true to say that Joe Gormley walked out. What he did was to bring back—admittedly in somewhat peremptory terms—the counter-offer of the miners. Anybody who knows anything about these negotiations realises that in whatever terms that counter-offer was couched, it did not amount to a walk-out. If the Secretary of State had wished to do so, he could have kept the negotiations going.

Mr. Crouch: The right hon. Gentleman and I understand that the space that separates us does not always separate our arguments in these matters. I do not want to say anything tonight that might exacerbate the impasse. The court of inquiry is meeting and perhaps I am talking about bygones.
In the debate on 18th January I accused the N.C.B. of failing to identify with the miners, and when the N.U.M. turned down the N.C.B.'s offer last week and refused to go on talking, I believe that it then became in danger of failing to identify with the public interest. This

saddens me because we are all concerned with the public interest now. We want to put Great Britain back in the game and back on the map. [Interruption.] I am not speaking jingoistically. This is desperately important.
We have a court of inquiry in progress. I hope that it will meet quickly, deliberate quickly and deliver its decision quickly. Everything that has happened has resulted in this court being established and the miners have said that they will co-operate immediately, day and night.
The miners could earn the respect of the nation and themselves a fair and just reward if they would return to work now. They would indeed earn the nation's respect, for we could hardly say "No" to them. It would be a magnificent gesture on their part. It may seem impossible, but if only they could do it they would be making one of those gestures which would be exceptional in industrial disputes.
I am not unhopeful of the future of industrial harmony in Britain, despite this tragic dispute which has caused a great shut-down of British industry. In my view this is the final downpour at the end of a storm which has been raging over Britain for 20 years. It has come not because of the Industrial Relations Act but because there is an inherent wish for harmony between management and men. There is a desire to achieve something in co-operation through negotiation and arbitration and not by waiting for this nineteenth century technique of going on strike.
Any group of men with a certain power behind them can hold the nation to ransom. This has always been the case. Perhaps it is more the case today with the power that the unions possess. I do not believe that the miners want to hold the nation to ransom. I know many miners. I have counted them among my friends for many years. They are members of a great community, but perhaps they are wrongly led into believing that they can have something which might jeopardise the economy for the rest of the country. Negotiation is the only way out of this dispute and I hope that at the end of this coming week we shall see a result.
Before the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) rises to wind up


for the Opposition, I appeal to him to realise that this is a great chance for him. He is one of our greatest debaters. He does not have a full House at the moment, but he will not be speaking for many moments before the House fills up. He has a chance tonight. While I would not ask him to keep the temperature down—that is not in his manner—he has a chance to think widely for Britain and not narrowly.
He must think about our real future. He will accept that, like him, I speak with concern for the miners. We look to him as an Opposition spokesman and statesman to accept this chance. He has an opportunity tonight to show the House that he is rising to this level of leadership on behalf of the whole nation.

9.0 p.m.

Mr. Michael Foot: I know that some of my hon. Friends have waited throughout this debate to take part in it and I am sorry if they now find themselves excluded, but I notify them that, as they will be well aware, there is to be a further debate on the regulations, in which it will no doubt be possible for them to take part.
Some of the things said by the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch) were certainly not acceptable to his own Front Bench. I have heard him speak in many mining debates and I know how sincere are his views. I hope to speak in the spirit he indicated, but I must at the very beginning say that I recognise no divergence between the interests of the miners and the interests of the nation. It is because we on this side believe that the Government have neglected the interests of both the miners and the nation that we find ourselves in the present situation.
The Opposition recognise that the situation facing the union and the country is extremely serious, and nothing that we say is intended to mitigate that fact. Even if a settlement is reached within a matter of days, or even if it were reached within a matter of hours, its costs and its consequences for the nation as a whole, for industry as a whole, and for the coal mining industry in particular, would still be extremely serious. When these debates on the emergency are over, and when the emergency is over, there must be further debates. We may need a Select Com

mittee to examine the cost of what has occurred.
The cost for the mining industry cannot be less than £100 million. Indeed, if we take the £20 million lost on the overtime ban and the £70 million or £80 million which so far must have been lost as a result of the strike—and further millions may still be lost—I expect that the cost for the coal mining industry will be well over £100 million. No one yet knows what will be the total cost for the rest of industry or what will be the cost for the Exchequer. The total cost of this industrial catastrophe will go into some hundreds of millions of pounds, and at some stage we will need to examine whose is the responsibility.
But what we are now faced with is the calamity itself. The calamity is still upon us, and we must see how it can be stopped at the very earliest point. These are some of the matters we are debating, and we debate them in that sense.
The first but not the only reason for the Opposition taking the almost unprecedented step of voting against the proposal for the declaration of a state of emergency is that we say that the responsibility for this calamity which has befallen the nation, and not only the miners, rests squarely with the Government who failed to foresee—or, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bedwellty (Mr. Kinnock) so eloquently said, if the Government, even more insidiously, did foresee—what was to be the result.
The cause of the catastrophe can be stated in a single sentence. The cause is that the Prime Minister and his colleagues scorned, first, the justice of the cause and, next, the resolve of the miners. In that sentence the whole origin of the crisis can be stated. What the Government have to explain—certainly no attempt was made by the Home Secretary earlier; I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State will do so later—is why the first intervention which they made which might even distantly be described as an attempt to be effective or reasonable was made 4½ weeks after the strike had started and on the very eve of the declaration of the crisis itself. Why those 4½ weeks, or, shall we say, some of the weeks earlier?
When speaking today the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary said that the conditions which have faced us over the weekend as a result of the declaration of emergency were quite well known at the start. I am not speaking to the right hon. Gentleman as Home Secretary but as Chairman of the Emergency Committee—the roundest peg in the squarest hole there ever was. But the right hon. Gentleman said that the conditions of this strike we face now were quite well known at the start.
Let us look calmly at what was being said by the Government and the newspapers prior to the strike. When the miners were declaring that they were likely to have a strike, way back in December—I take these only at random; I could spend the whole evening with similar quotations—the Daily Telegraph of 2nd December said:
A strike would be damaging in some ways, though fortunately coal stocks are large.
That was their story then.
John Torode reported in The Guardian on 10th December
The Government has made its decision and the National Coal Board has been given the message in the firm, but discreet way in which such messages spread from Whitehall. If the mineworkers want to play it rough, then the Government is fully prepared to sit out a national pit strike from January 9 rather than let the 280,000 miners sabotage the current seven per cent. pay 'norm'.
If I had read out that quotation at the time, no doubt a Minister would have said, "That cannot be true; you cannot trust what you read in the newspapers". But, as events have turned out, what he has described appears to be an exact description of the four and a half weeks I am trying to analyse, between the moment when the strike started and when the Government made their first attempted intervention.
If the Government do not like The Guardian, they can turn to The Times, in which Paul Routledge said on 23rd December:
The Government do not want any compromise solution which would increase the offer to the nation's 280,000 miners.
On 31st December the Daily Telegraph said:
Coal stocks now stand at 30 million tons, so the country is in a good position to face a stoppage.

The Economist, which always probes these matters more delicately than some others, finished an article on 24th December by saying:
And although the Government all along encouraged the chairman, Mr. Derek Ezra, to stand firm, some ministers "—
I wonder who they are—
shy from any thought of increasing unemployment this winter, as a coal strike necessarily must.
So according to the Economist there were one or two Ministers who were warning the others.
The best defence, indeed, the only defence of the Chairman of the Emergency Committee, or the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, or the Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity, and the only excuse for them, all of them, is that they were taking orders from the Prime Minister. I shall come to him shortly.—[An HON. MEMBER: "Where is he?"]—We shall come to him, whether or not he deigns to come to the House.
I come first to the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. As soon as the House met after the Christmas Recess, when the strike had already been on for some days, the first business which the Opposition demanded should be discussed in the House was the coal strike. My right hon. Friend the Chief Whip made his approaches. We did not find an eager response to have such a debate, but a debate was forced.
What did the right hon. Gentleman say in that debate? Did he warn all the nation of the perils we now face? Did he tell us how serious the national strike would be? Did he tell us what his colleagues sitting beside him said that we knew from the start? This is what the right hon. Gentleman said:
So here we are witnessing a damaging strike liable to cause great inconvenience, and even hardship…at present the impact on the community as a whole is slight and patchy. Stocks are reasonably high throughout the country.
—the same old Daily Telegraph story which was encouraging them to think that they did not have to face anything so serious—
In case further measures have to be taken, the Government are keeping the situation continually under review."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th January, 1972; Vol. 829, c. 237.]


So everything was all right. Everything was satisfactory.
If the right hon. Gentleman had wanted to warn the nation of the perils ahead, perils which now encompass us, he might have done so on 18th January. If he had done so, who knows—even the Secretary of State for Employment might have started some negotiations then. That might have been done on 18th January, but nothing happened.
Nothing happened between that debate and the next debate demanded by the Opposition some days later on 8th February, except that on the morning of that debate the Opposition spokesman on coal matters—my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. Harold Lever)—was informed that a state of emergency was to be declared a little later. It was very gracious of them to tell us about it.
Let us see whether it is the case that everything could have been foreseen and that everything has gone according to plan, that everything was properly arranged. It may be the Government's view that nothing out of the ordinary has happened, that nothing has happened that they should be concerned about. However, it is not what their friends in the newspapers are saying. They do not say that the Government should be excused for what has happened.
Yesterday's Sunday Telegraph said this
The Government played a desperate gamble declaring a State of Emergency with an air of almost casual unconcern…The gamble failed with the breakdown of the talks.
If the Government do not like the Sunday Telegraph, I quote from the Daily Telegraph of 12th February:
It is an emergency for which the Government, obviously, was unprepared…Is the Government intending to give in to the miners, once it has found a means of doing so without losing too much face? It would be a pity if this were so; but, if it is, there is much to be said for doing it at once, openly and honestly, rather than subject the public to ultimately pointless hardship and inconvenience.
Next, The Times—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I know that hon. Gentlemen may not like it. Perhaps they can save their shouts for the moment.
The emergency plans should certainly have been available in greater detail when Mr. Davies gave the announcement yesterday; it is deplorable that industry should be left so

confused about what its situation is likely to be in the coming week.

Mr. Rost: Will the hon. Gentleman now give us a quote of his own and tell the House whether he believes that the miners should go back pending the report of the court of inquiry?

Mr. Foot: I will give the hon. Gentleman my exact answer to that in the course of my speech; I promise him that. [HON. MEMBERS: "Answer."] I promise the hon. Gentleman that I will not forget.
Or perhaps the Secretary of State will tell us what he thinks of the statement by Mr. Walter Terry in the Daily Mail today, to the effect—[HON. MEMBERS: "Come on."] I know that hon. Gentlemen do not like these matters being quoted, but we were told by the Government when many hon. Members opposite were not present that everything had been foreseen. The Home Secretary, who started the debate said, right at the start, "We could foresee what the circumstances were." All I am doing is to probe and ascertain whether that is true, and, in the face of all the evidence from so many quarters, in face of the view expressed by industry throughout the country and the view which has been expressed in pretty well every Conservative newspaper, let alone the others, whether the right hon. Gentleman is still trying to sustain the view that this crisis is something that the Government foresaw. If they did foresee it and allowed it to happen, the condemnation is all the greater.
I give the right hon. Gentleman this quotation:
Right from the beginning of the strike five weeks ago there was no lack of information. Cabinet Ministers were given the fullest accounts of how fragile the fuel stocks were.
So when the right hon. Gentleman replies to the debate—I hope some of his back benchers do not think this too unfair—I hope he will tell us exactly what was the position of fuel stocks all through those weeks. What were the reports to the Emergency Committee and what steps did the Emergency Committee think it should take in the face of those facts?
I said that we were facing a calamity. We faced that calamity when the right hon. Gentleman came along and made his declaration last Friday. That was the first complete—if it was fully complete—statement of the scale of the crisis which


the country had to face, and it was made evident then that the Prime Minister, although he was not going to be able to address the House on that occasion, was making a speech that evening. I must say that I would have thought that a Prime Minister who had to make a speech on a Friday evening, when large stretches of British industry were closing down and when we were facing one of the grimmest industrial prospects that had been known for generations, would have taken special care. When I read that speech on Saturday morning I looked through it carefully to see whether one word appeared in that speech in which the Prime Minister accepted a scintilla of responsibility for the situation in which the country then found itself. I searched it all—not a word, not a whisper. It was all somebody else's fault. The Prime Minister's self-righteousness, as usual, was armour plated.
I wonder whether the Prime Minister understands what effect those words had in the places where they were supposed to have some effect. The Prime Minister presumably was trying to end the strike. Presumably he was trying to make an appeal to the miners, to their families and to the mining communities. He ought to know—I hope he has read the reports in The Times—[An HON. MEMBER: "Not again!"] The Times had a reporter in the Monmouthshire valleys, where they get the coal, and that is where the answer came. If some hon. Members had attended the debate a little longer they might have heard a bit more of what is happening in Monmouthshire and Nottinghamshire; they might have heard what is happening in the country, and why the appeal of the Prime Minister was so hopeless and so counter-productive. This is the sort of thing we read in The Times today. George Stewart, a dairyman in Monmouthshire, a comrade of the miners, said:
Mr. Heath and people like him must think that miners are illiterate tribesmen to be crushed. Before his speech on Friday I was 100 per cent. behind the men here; now I am 500 per cent. behind them. Ask anybody in Newbridge and you will get the same answer.
Hon. Members opposite may sneer and jeer at such sentiments if they wish, but their shouts and jeers will not dig any coal. The only way to get coal is to get the miners to go back and cut it.
How can we do that? The hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East (Mr. Rost) put the question to me. I have no power to instruct miners to go back. I have no power to exhort any miners to go back. But this House of Commons, if it has any sense, should use its brains and its skill to try to produce conditions which will persuade miners to go back.
That is what I believe in, the politics of persuasion. The politics of persuasion should have been tried in this dispute at least four-and-a-half weeks ago, or five weeks ago, before the strike ever started. That is the time when it should have been done. No one can say that I have not said this to the House before. Some hon. Members who have spoken in the debate have asked what was said in previous mining debates. They should study what happened and what arguments passed in this Chamber not merely this winter but last winter, too. We had debates about these matters, which the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State will remember. He will recall them, even if his hon. Friends do not.
I do not like to quote my own words—I know that hon. Member would not care for that—but I said that it was only by a hair's breadth that we escaped last winter the situation that we have this winter Fifteen months ago, in October, November and December, we on this side—my hon. Friends from mining constituencies can say it much more forcefully than I can—urged the House to learn from what happened. "If you do no4 learn", we said, "if the House of Commons does not learn, we are heading for catastrophe".
I have never doubted that a mining strike was a catastrophe for Britain. No one who has heard our debates on coal will dipute that I have always recognised that this country's fuel supplies are so dependent upon coal that, of course, every possible exertion, ingenunity and skill should be used to prevent such a strike as this ever taking place. Now, it is infinitely more—

Mrs. Elaine Kellet-Bowman: rose—

Mr. Foot: —infinitely more difficult, and what the country has to understand—

Mrs. Kellet-Bowman: rose—

Hon. Members: Give way.

Mr. Foot: —what the country has to understand, what the House of Commons has to understand, and what all those who have been to mining areas or who represent mining constituencies already understand, is that it is much more difficult to settle the strike now than it was four-and-half weeks ago. Of course it is.
Miners can be determined, too. Everyone who knows the situation knows that it is, therefore, far more difficult to settle today than it might have been four-and-a-half weeks ago, or, better still, before that, if hon. Members opposite and the Government had learned from the warnings that we were giving not weeks but months ago.
So I return to where I started, by saying that we certainly regard this as a most serious crisis. The responsibility for it rests upon the Government, but we have to solve it. The Opposition will vote against the emergency powers tonight not only because we believe the Government must bear the responsibility for their grotesque mishandling of the strike but also because if their emergency powers are voted clearly by the House there is no promise or undertaking that they will not use them to prolong the strike rather than to settle it. We have had enough of this from the Prime Minister already—[HON. MEMBERS: "Where is he?"]—even if he does not dare to come here and answer the case we have to put.
All over this episode, all over this industrial clash, all over the events of these weeks, all over the orders to the Ministers who have dealt with these matters so incompetently in their own Departments, has presided the Prime Minister and his determination. On the crisis is stamped the titanic statesmanship of the Prime Minister—full speed ahead for the iceberg. That is how British industry has been brought into the most serious situation this country has known for generations.
So I say to the Government that we shall have further investigations to make sure that the cost of the catastrophe is estimated, further investigations to see that the responsibility is properly laid. But what we demand immediately is a change by the Government and a recognition of what they have neglected

throughout—the rights and the resolve of the miners to win their just claim.

9.27 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and President of the Board of Trade (Mr. John Davies): Mr. Speaker—[HON. MEMBERS: "Where is Ted?"]—This has hitherto been a serious debate on a very serious day. I am rather disspirited to hear the extraordinary outburst which, before I have even uttered a word to wind up for the Government, greets the end of this debate. It is singularly out of character with the debate as it has so far proceeded.
Although I acknowledge the right of the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) to put a long series of questions to the Government, to state his views of their incompetence, and ask them to answer to those views, what he had to say was purely incandescent—[Laughter.]—hon. Members opposite may laugh if they will, but at the same time I ask them to remember that to try to allow this debate to degenerate into hilarity and stupidity will do nothing to contribute towards solving the problems with which we are faced.
The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale may reproach the Government with many things. He may reproach me with many things. But he will not deny that I have spent my working life in and for British industry. I have spent it little expecting that, on Friday last week, I would find myself having to take, under the pressure of very distressing circumstances, the most drastic steps against the immediate future production of industry whose interests have lain at my heart for so many years.
In the debate, out of the many issues that have been raised, I have detected perhaps five principal points upon which there is great questioning of the Government and great doubt of what they have done. First, there has been a strong charge that the Government were taken wholly unprepared by the circumstances which have arisen. The second is that the Government failed to consult those who, at an appropriate time, could usefully have advised and helped them. The third is that the Government tampered with the operations of the National Coal Board in the conduct of its negotiations. Fourthly—and rather contradictorily—it is suggested that the Government did


not intervene early enough after the breakdown.

Mr. Molloy: Guilty on all charges.

Mr. Davies: The fifth item has been the whole question of picketing. [Interruption.] If the Leader of the Opposition wishes to have a good joke with his neighbour, please let him have it—and let me get on with my speech.
As I was saying, the fifth item is the whole question of picketing and its effect upon the circumstances we have witnessed. That item I propose not to try to deal with extensively. It has been extensively dealt with by many hon. Members on both sides of the House, particularly by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.
Before I come to these specific criticisms, to which I promise to come, and in detail, let me first of all—because I believe that it would be for the use and convenience of the House—state what are the conditions in industry today and what is the effect upon the working life of the country. The whole House would wish to know what are the latest figures that I can give of the situation.
The amount of coal stocks at generating stations at the moment is approximately 4·8 million tons. Of that total quantity, about 2·2 millions tons were denied to use by the Central Electricity Generating Board by picketing and other factors. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] I find it surprising that there should be any rejoicing at all. In normal conditions at this time of the year, the consumption of coal by the Board is about 1½ million tons per week. The restrictions which I set down last Friday are aimed at achieving something in the nature of 20 to 25 per cent. economy in the general load of the board. That proportion would be improved to the degree that the domestic consumer responds to the strong appeals made for economy. If that response were satisfactory, the total economy in use could rise to perhaps something of the nature of a third of the total load.
At present, with the stocks which are there and available for use, the anticipated endurance of the C.E.G.B. is approximately two weeks at the present rate of consumption. [An HON. MEMBER: "Go and dig it yourself."]

The arithmetic, for those who are determined to look at it, is not exact because among these stocks there are undoubtedly quantities which are by no means recoverable.
I shall deal with the first of the charges—namely, that this has all blown up unexpectedly. The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale made much of newspaper references and I appreciate that he draws a great deal of his information from that source. I should like to quote what my hon. Friend the Minister for Industry said on 9th January, the day the strike started:
Since it is impossible to predict the likely duration of the strike, it is most important that from now on all consumers use coal with the maximum economy. Coal-using industry, even where stocks are above the national average at five weeks' supply, should now adopt strict fuel control measures.
May I go on, since this was at a time when this House was not sitting. My hon. Friend continued:
Power stations have stocks equivalent to about eight weeks' normal winter consumption.
We are now in the sixth week of the strike. We have two weeks of endurance at present levels with no access to about 2¼ million tons of coal.
The figuring is, if I may say so, absolutely precise. The position has arrived exactly as the Minister for Industry foresaw it. It has been reinforced during this period quite clearly by various warnings which have come forward from the C.E.G.B.

Mr. Russell Kerr: Why does not the right hon. Gentleman do something about it?

Mr. Davies: I will come to that. At the end of the two weeks' period—I believe it is important that the House should know what the situation is—if there is no change at all in the situation as we see it today, the Generating Board's capacity will be down to approximately 20 to 25 per cent. of normal load. If it were at this level, it would about suffice only to keep essential services going. The total domestic and industrial load is approximately 80 per cent. of the Generating Board's capacity. So at the moment the clear inference is that there would be neither electricity for industry nor for the home. I say this because it


is right it is realised precisely what could lie ahead.
Equally, I must tell the House that in such an event there is no experience in handling electricity supply at these low levels. The certainty of being able to provide for essential services must be regarded as pretty precarious. Therefore, if there is no shift in the present position it is inescapable that further and early restrictions of a still more determined kind might well have to be applied, and they will have to be applied to those areas not concerned with the essential services of the nation.
I say a word about other fuels in terms of oil and gas supply. Despite some incidents of relatively minor importance, the supply remains approximately normal, though there are some places where, owing to their reliance still on coal carbonisation, they may be in some difficulty for gas.
As for solid domestic fuels, the response to the statement of my hon. Friend the Minister for Industry has been exceedingly good—

Mr. Loughlin: Who is he?

Mr. Davies: If I may say so to the hon. Member for Gloucestershire, West (Mr. Loughlin), this is a rather critical matter. It has proved possible, in response to that appeal, for coal merchants to do exactly what was asked of them. Despite some picketing, as a result I believe of the N.U.M.'s strong undertaking to its members, the restriction to priority customers of the kind called for at that time has been respected. Even so, stocks of household coal are now dangerously low.
As for industry, the position is also one of a steady consumption of the stocks available. At the beginning of the strike, stocks were of the order of five weeks' supply for industry. They are now down to a little over two weeks' supply. But the probability is that the more serious restriction, obviously, will be in electricity supply than in industries' own coal stocks. As I warned the House some time ago, the steel industry has been badly hit. It has been obliged to restrict its throughput to the point where it can retain fuel simply to preserve ovens at a reasonable heat for the purposes of future maintenance.
Looking to the future, if the picketing restraints were raised, the two weeks' endurance to which I have referred could reasonably be expected to be extended by between a week and 10 days.
If the strike were settled and there were early access to the pithead stocks which, in terms of generating coal, amount to some 4 million tons, clearly that would enable the situation of the run-back to normal work to be maintained on a progressive and sound basis, though the period of restriction of supplies will last for weeks after the resumption of work.
It is very difficult to estimate what the rate of production will be in the pits on a resumption of work. But if the strike goes on into and through next week, the progressive deterioration in the state of mines will constitute an important factor. The likely production on a resumption after next week, assuming there were a resumption after next week, would be not more than 40 per cent. of normal production in the first week. Thereafter, there would be a period of three weeks or so during which production would run up to a level of between 75 and 80 per cent. of normal production. When the remaining 20 or 25 per cent. would be obtained is a matter of conjecture. It would depend substantially on the state of pits when they were re-entered.
The most unhappy part of this whole dispute, I believe, has been the neglect of safety in the pits. Of 300 pits altogether, far more than 200 have not been maintained in a fit state. The fact that there has been maintenance at the level that we have seen is largely due to the very determined efforts of the supervisors, who have worked exceedingly hard trying to keep things going.
On all other fuel supply fronts, a resumption of work in the pits would ease the parallel rapid resumption of normal conditions in other sections of industry. But it is necessary to repeat that, whatever the outcome of this unhappy strike, whenever it is settled, the country must be prepared to see a substantial period of time thereafter when restrictions on electricity will be a fundamental problem in homes, the essential services and industry alike.
I turn now, as promised, to the question of the preparedness for the situation with which the Government have been so strongly charged. I refer particularly to statements made by the hon. Members for Ebbw Vale and Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams) and the right hon. Member for Leeds, West (Mr. C. Pannell).
Since the problems of last winter, when electricity supply was so seriously hampered, we undertook a massive programme of reappraisal of emergency conditions. It involved a wide degree of consultation with industry and other users throughout the country. As a result of this heavy programme of consultation, a plan was drawn up as long ago as last November under which we would meet conditions of the kind which we are now facing. Any kind of pretence that this was a completely unprepared and unprogrammed proposition is entirely erroneous.
At that time it was necessary to identify those 20,000 individual industrial users who had more than a minimium of 100 kilowatts use in industry and to deal with them individually in the case of major restrictions on industry. Consultation in this sphere was exceedingly wide and involved these many concerns as well as their representative bodies. To imagine for a moment that there has been, so to speak, an absolute vacuum of activity until last week is completely wrong and nonsensical. If I may say so, to be able to deliver 20,000 individual letters of direction to the 20,000 companies concerned on the day that I made my statement last week was not pure accident. Moreover—[Interruption.] I am endeavouring to answer the question which—

Sir Harmar Nicholls: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. The House listened in silence to a demagogic journalist who has never held office. Cannot we give some attention to the Minister who has responsibility?

Mr. Speaker: I hope that the House will listen to the Minister in reasonable silence.

Mr. Davies: I am seeking, despite interruptions, to answer some questions which I was pressed very strongly to answer and which I now seek to do.
The outcome of this very big consultative exercise was a big dilemma, and I

wish the House to listen to it because it poses the fundamental problem of dealing with this kind of issue. The fact is that one has to make a decision whether to prefer the maintenance of industrial supply or the maintenance of electrical supply to millions of households.
There are 18 million electrical consumers. Of these about 200,000 are industrial accounts of which 20,000 only are major accounts of the kind which I have mentioned. If we are to do what we decided to do—namely, to make the 18 million private households the critical factor in restricted supply—then we have to devise a system, which we did, whereby we do not concentrate in successive days on individual households the maximum risk of supply restriction. If we do, the natural result is that households where there is hardship—where there are old people, invalids, children, and the like—can, under severe conditions of restraint, find themselves day after day without hot water and heat. As a matter of cold decision we decided that we would—[Laughter.]—Hon. Gentlemen opposite may find it exceedingly humorous but the problem of trying to deal with this issue in a serious and competent way is immense.
We adopted a system of rota disconnections, but the inevitable implication of that from an industrial point of view was that industry could not have a way of ensuring that there were consecutive days of supply for industry because, if that were done, the result automatically would be that industry would not only have the days on which it was prohibited from using electricity but would also suffer on the other days from increasing risks of rota disconnection. I have sought to explain what went on in the consultations, that they were not at all superficial or late in the day, and that the Government had to face this major problem.
Now I come to why did not—[Laughter.]—Why laugh? Hon. Gentlemen opposite posed these questions during the debate, and I am seeking to reply to them. The question has been asked, why did not the Government act sooner to intervene in this operation? As I have sought to show, the Government were well aware of the situation that was developing and they had prepared themselves to deal with it. But they faced a big problem, and that was that the single


main priority in terms of action by any Government in this respect was to bring about, if humanly possible, a negotiated settlement between the N.C.B. and the N.U.M.
When the talks between those two bodies broke down at the beginning of January, the parties were poles apart, miles apart in their approach to the problem. The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale asked why we let four and a half weeks go by. Has he forgotten that on 19th January Mr. Feather, the General Secretary of the T.U.C., tried hard to bring the two parties together?—[Interruption.]—My right hon. Friend saw Mr. Feather to see what could be done, and the answer was "Nothing." The parties were so far apart that nothing could be done. The situation continued with the parties completely and resolutely occupying their own positions, without any intention of coming together for discussion.

Mr. Foot: Would it not have brought the parties a bit nearer to each other if the Secretary of State for Employment had come forward four and a half weeks ago with the proposal that he made last Wednesday?

Mr. Davies: I take it that the hon. Gentleman is referring to the court of inquiry. My right hon. Friend made that proposition. The board made a proposition. The proposition made by my right hon. Friend was a court of inquiry, and that was excluded by the N.U.M. throughout the four and a half weeks. It is an illusion which the bon. Gentleman seeks to fasten upon us that it was open at any time for my right hon. Friend to call in these parties to discuss the matter.

Mr. Foot: rose—

Mr. Davies: No. We have heard a great deal from the hon. Gentleman.
In facing the problem, my right hon. Friend had somehow to judge the moment of time at which it was possible to try to bring the parties together. We had to judge that moment of time, and he did. He sought to get them together, and he did all that he could to bring them to neutral negotiations again. For a time it seemed—and I think that hon. Gentlemen opposite will recognise this—as though that was going to work. It seemed as though nego

tiations would get going. But on Thursday of last week that negotiation finally broke down as an endeavour, on a normal reasoning basis between the parties, to reach a settlement, with an immense gap still separating the two parties. In those circumstances my right hon. Friend had no course but to ask for a court of inquiry and, on the day, had no course but to take the steps which were quite clearly impending in terms of the emergency.

Mr. Harold Wilson: Will the right hon. Gentleman tell us this? If, as he has told the House tonight, the consequences of this were known five weeks ago, why is it that the Prime Minister, who could not even appear last Friday to back up his hapless colleagues, did not intervene? He is the only Prime Minister since the war who would not have done so.

Mr. Davies: Not untypically, the right hon. Gentleman seeks to intervene not at all on a point I was making—[HON. MEMBERS: "Answer."]
I come to another question which I was asked and which I have promised to answer. I have been asked many questions in debate and the right hon. Gentleman poses something entirely different. I have been asked to what degree the Government were holding the strings of a National Coal Board puppet. The answer is that they were not.
What is certainly true—and I have never denied it and I will not deny it—is that the Government never failed to make known to Mr. Ezra and the National Coal Board negotiators their grave concern with the rate of inflation in wage settlements. [Interruption.] Who would not? If hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite were in Government, would they have failed to do that? Right hon. Gentlemen opposite are the first to make objections. Would they have stood silent? [Interruption.] This hilarity contributes nothing to one of the greatest problems we have ever had. It seems to me that it would be tragic in the circumstances we have to face today if this debate were to degenerate in its last few minutes into the usual extraordinary uproarious disinclination to listen or understand.
The fact is that we have to see the miners resume work. Every member of this House has a personal interest to ensure that that takes place. There is an


absolutely reasonable arrangement proposed to the National Union of Mineworkers. No Member of this House is fulfilling his appropriate duty to the House and country if he does not seek to use all his capacities and powers to ensure that that return to work takes place. Any failure to do so constitutes for me a very real disregard of the duties of this House as I have understood them and as I hope they will remain.

Mr. Loughlin: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

The Treasurer of Her Majesty's Household (Mr. Humphrey Atkins): rose in his place, and claimed to move, That the Question be now put.

Mr. Loughlin: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I think that a little of this excitement may be due to the fact that the clocks in the Chamber are not showing quite the same time.

Mr. Loughlin: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Later.

Question, That the Question be now put, put and agreed to.

Question put accordingly:—

The House divided: Ayes, 315, Noes, 276.

Division No. 56.]
AYES
[10.0 p.m.


Adley, Robert
Coombs, Derek
Gray, Hamish


Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)
Cooper, A. E.
Green, Alan


Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)
Cordle, John
Grieve, Percy


Amery, Rt. Hn. Julian
Corfield, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)


Archer, Jeffrey (Louth)
Cormack, Patrick
Grylls, Michael


Astor, John
Costain, A. P.
Gummer, J. Selwyn


Atkins, Humphrey
Critchley, Julian
Gurden, Harold


Awdry, Daniel
Crouch, David
Hall, Miss Joan (Keighley)


Baker, Kenneth (St. Marylebone)
Crowder, F. P.
Hall, John (Wycombe)


Balniel, Rt. Hn. Lord
Curran, Charles
Hall-Davis, A. G. F.


Batsford, Brian
Davies, Rt. Hn. John (Knutsford)
Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)


Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Hannam, John (Exeter)


Bell, Ronald
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Maj.-Gen. James
Harrison, Brian (Maldon)


Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torquay)
Dean, Paul
Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)


Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gosport)
Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F.
Haselhurst, Alan


Benyon, W.
Digby, Simon Wingfield
Hastings, Stephen


Berry, Hn. Anthony
Dixon, Piers
Havers, Michael


Biffen, John
Dodds-Parker, Douglas
Hawkins, Paul


Biggs-Davison, John
Drayson, G. B.
Hay, John


Blaker, Peter
du Cann, Rt. Hn. Edward
Hayhoe, Barney


Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S.W.)
Dykes, Hugh
Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward


Body, Richard
Eden, Sir John
Heseltine, Michael


Boscawen, Robert
Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)
Hicks, Robert


Bossom, Sir Clive
Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Higgins, Terence L.


Bowden, Andrew
Elliott, R. W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)
Hiley, Joseph


Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hn. John
Emery, Peter
Hill, John E. B. (Norfolk, S.)


Braine, Sir Bernard
Farr, John
Hill, James (Southampton, Test)


Bray, Ronald
Fell, Anthony
Holland, Philip


Brewis, John
Fenner, Mrs. Peggy
Holt, Miss Mary


Brinton Sir Tatton
Fidler, Michael
Hordern, Peter


Brocklebank-Fowler, Christopher
Finsberg, Geoffrey (Hampstead)
Hornby, Richard


Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)
Fisher, Nigel (Surbiton)
Howe, Hn. Sir Geoffrey (Reigate)


Bruce-Gardyne, J.
Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Howell, David (Guildford)


Bryan, Paul
Fookes, Miss Janet
Howell, Ralph (Norfolk, N.)


Buchanan-Smith, Alick (Angus, N &amp; M)
Fortescue, Tim
Hunt, John


Buck, Antony
Foster, Sir John
Hutchison, Michael Clark


Bullus, Sir Eric




Burden, F. A.
Fowler, Norman
Iremonger, T. L.


Butler, Adam (Bosworth)
Fox, Marcus
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)


Campbell, Rt. Hn. G. (Moray &amp; Nairn)
Fry, Peter
James, David


Carlisle, Mark
Galbraith, Hn. T. G.
Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)


Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert
Gardner, Edward
Jennings, J. C. (Burton)


Channon, Paul
Gibson-Watt, David
Jessel, Toby


Chapman, Sydney
Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, C.)
Johnson Smith, G. (E. Grinstead)


Chataway, Rt. Hn. Christopher
Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)
Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)


Chichester-Clark, R.
Glyn, Dr. Alan
Jopling, Michael


Churchill, W. S.
Godber, Rt. Hn. J. B.
Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith


Clark, William (Surrey, E.)
Goodhart, Philip
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs. Elaine


Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)
Goodhew, Victor
Kershaw, Anthony


Clegg, Walter
Gorst, John
Kilfedder, James


Cockeram, Eric
Gower, Raymond
Kimball, Marcus


Cooke, Robert
Grant, Anthony (Harrow, C.)
King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)




King, Tom (Bridgwater)
Neave, Airey
Speed, Keith


Kinsey, J. R.
Nicholls, Sir Harmar
Spence, John


Kirk, Peter
Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael
Sproat, Iain


Kitson, Timothy
Normanton, Tom
Stainton, Keith


Knight, Mrs. Jill
Nott, John
Stanbrook, Ivor


Knox, David
Onslow, Cranley
Stewart-Smith, Geoffrey (Belper)


Lambton, Lord
Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally
Stoddart, David (Swindon)


Lane, David
Orr, Capt. L. P. S.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M.


Langford-Holt, Sir John
Osborn, John
Stokes, John


Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry
Owen, Idris (Stockport, N.)
Stuttaford, Dr. Tom


Le Marchant, Spencer
Page, Graham (Crosby)
Sutcliffe, John


Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Page, John (Harrow, W.)
Tapsell, Peter


Lloyd, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey (Sut' nC' dfield)
Parkinson, Cecil
Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)


Lloyd, Ian (P'tsm'th, Langstone)
Peel, John
Taylor, Edward M. (G'gow, Cathcart)


Longden, Sir Gilbert
Percival, Ian
Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)


Loveridge, John
Peyton, Rt. Hn. John
Taylor, Robert (Croydon, N.W.)


Luce, R. N.
Pike, Miss Mervyn
Tebbit, Norman


McAdden, Sir Stephen
Pink, R. Bonner
Temple, John M.


MacArthur, Ian
Pounder, Rafton
Thatcher, Rt. Hn. Mrs. Margaret


McCrindle, R. A.
Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch
Thomas, John Stradling (Monmouth)


McLaren, Martin
Price, David (Eastleigh)
Thomas, Rt. Hn. Peter (Hendon, S.)


Maclean, Sir Fitzroy
Prior, Rt. Hn. J. M. L.
Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.


McMaster, Stanley
Proudloot, Wilfred
Tilney, John


Macmillan, Rt. Hn. Maurice (Farnham)
Pym, Rt. Hn. Francis
Trafford, Dr. Anthony


McNair-Wilson, Michael
Quennell, Miss J. M.
Trew, Peter


McNair-Wilson, Patrick (New Forest)
Raison, Timothy
Tugendhat, Christopher


Maddan, Martin
Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James
Turton, Rt. Hn. Sir Robin


Madel, David
Rawlinson, Rt. Hn. Sir Peter
van Straubenzee, W. R.


Maginnis, John E.
Redmond, Robert
Vaughan, Dr. Gerard


Marples, Rt. Hn. Ernest
Reed, Laurance (Bolton, E.)
Vickers, Dame Joan


Marten, Neil
Rees, Peter (Dover)
Waddington, David


Mather, Carol
Rees-Davies, W. R.
Walder, David (Clitheroe)


Maude, Angus
Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David
Walker, Rt. Hn. Peter (Worcester)


Maudling, Rt. Hn. Reginald
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon
Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek


Mawby, Ray
Ridley, Hn. Nicholas
Wall, Patrick


Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
Ridsdale, Julian
Walters, Dennis


Meyer, Sir Anthony
Rippon, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey
Ward, Dame Irene


Mills, Peter (Torrington)
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff, N.)
Warren, Kenneth


Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.)
Roberts, Wyn (Conway)
Wells, John (Maidstone)


Miscampbell, Norman
Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)
White, Roger (Gravesend)


Mitchell, Lt.-Col. C.(Aberdeenshire, W.)
Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)
Whitelaw, Rt. Hn. William


Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)
Rost, Peter
Wiggin, Jerry


Moate, Roger
Royle, Anthony
Wilkinson, John


Molyneaux, James
Russell, Sir Ronald
Winterton, Nicholas


Money, Ernie
St. John-Stevas, Norman
Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick


Monks, Mrs. Connie
Sandys, Rt. Hn. D.
Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard


Monro, Hector
Scott, Nicholas
Woodhouse, Hn. Christopher


Montgomery, Fergus
Scott-Hopkins, James
Woodnutt, Mark


More, Jasper
Sharples, Richard
Worsley, Marcus


Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)
Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh &amp; Whitby)
Wylie, Rt. Hn. N. R.


Morgan-Giles, Rear-Adm.
Shelton, William (Clapham)
Younger, Hn. George


Morrison, Charles
Simeons, Charles



Mudd, David
Sinclair, Sir George
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Murton, Oscar
Skeet, T. H. H.
Mr. Reginald Eyre and


Nabarro. Sir Gerald
Smith, Dudley (W'wick &amp; L'mington)
Mr. Bernard Weatherill




NOES


Abse, Leo
Brown, Ronald (Shoreditch &amp; F'bury)
Davies, Ifor (Gower)


Albu, Austen
Buchan, Norman
Davis, Clinton (Hackney, C.)


Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)
Davis, Terry (Bromsgrove)


Allen, Scholefield
Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)
Deakins, Eric


Archer, Peter (Rowley Regis)
Campbell, I. (Dunbartonshire, W.)
de Freitas, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey


Ashley, Jack
Cant, R. B.
Delargy, H. J.


Ashton, Joe
Carmichael, Neil
Dell, Rt. Hn. Edmund


Atkinson, Norman
Carter, Ray (Birmingh'm, Northfield)
Dempsey, James


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Carter-Jones, Lewis (Eccles)
Dormand, J. D.


Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)
Clark, David (Colne Valley)
Douglas, Dick (Stirlingshire, E.)


Barnett, Joel (Heywood and Royton)
Cocks, Michael (Bristol, S.)
Douglas-Mann, Bruce


Baxter, William
Cohen, Stanley
Driberg, Tom


Beaney, Alan
Coleman, Donald
Duffy, A. E. P.


Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood
Concannon, J. D.
Dunn, James A.


Bennett, James (Glasgow, Bridgeton)
Conlan, Bernard
Dunnett, Jack


Bidwell, Sydney
Corbet, Mrs. Freda



Bishop, E. S.
Cox, Thomas (Wandsworth, C.)
Eadie, Alex


Blenkinsop, Arthur
Crawshaw, Richard
Edelman, Maurice


Boardman, H. (Leigh)
Cronin, John
Edwards, Robert (Bilston)


Booth, Albert
Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony
Ellis, Tom


Bottomley, Rt. Hn. Arthur
Cunningham, G. (Islington, S.W.)
English, Michael


Boyden, James (Bishop Auckland)
Cunningham, Dr. J. A. (Whitehaven)
Evans, Fred


Bradley, Tom
Dalyell, Tam
Ewing, Henry


Broughton, Sir Alfred
Darling, Rt. Hn. George
Fernyhough, Rt. Hn. E.


Brown, Bob (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, W.)
Davidson, Arthur
Fisher, Mrs. Doris (B'ham, Ladywood)


Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow Provan)
Davies, Denzil (Llanelly)
Fitch, Alan (Wigan)




Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)
Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham, N.)
Richard, Ivor


Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Foley, Maurice
Lipton, Marcus
Roberts, Rt. Hn. Goronwy (Caernarvon)


Foot, Michael
Lomas, Kenneth
Robertson, John (Paisley)


Ford, Ben
Loughlin, Charles
Roderick, Caerwyn E. (Br'c'n &amp; R'dnor)


Forrester, John
Lyon, Alexander W. (York)
Rodgers, William (Stockton-on-Tees)


Fraser, John (Norwood)
Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)
Roper, John


Freeson, Reginald
McBride, Neil
Rose, Paul B.


Galpern, Sir Myer
McCann, John
Ross, Rt. Hn. William (Kilmarnock)


Garrett, W. E.
McElhone, Frank
Sandelson, Neville


Gilbert, Dr. John
McGuire, Michael
Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-under-Lyne)


Ginsburg, David (Dewsbury)
Mackenzie, Gregor
Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)


Golding, John
Mackie, John
Short, Rt. Hn. Edward (N'c'tle-u-Tyne)


Gordon Walker, Rt. Hn. P. C.
Mackintosh, John P.
Short, Mrs. Renee (W'hampton, N.E.)


Gourlay, Harry
Maclennan, Robert
Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)


Grant, George (Morpeth)
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)
Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)


Grant, John D. (Islington, E.)
McNamara, J. Kevin
Sillars, James


Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)
Mahon, Simon (Bootle)
Silverman, Julius


Griffiths, Will (Exchange)
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Skinner, Dennis


Grimond, Rt. Hn. J.
Marks, Kenneth
Small, William


Hamilton, James (Bothwell)
Marquand, David
Smith, John (Lanarkshire, N.)


Hamilton, William (Fife, W.)
Marsden, F.
Spearing, Nigel


Hamling, William
Marshall, Dr. Edmund
Spriggs, Leslie


Hannan, William (G'gow, Maryhill)
Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy
Stallard, A. W.


Hardy, Peter
Mayhew, Christopher
Steel, David


Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Meacher, Michael
Stewart, Rt. Hn. Michael (Fulham)


Hart, Rt. Hn. Judith
Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert
Stoddart, David (Swindon)


Healey, Rt. Hn. Denis
Mendelson, John
Stonehouse, Rt. Hn. John


Heffer, Eric S.
Mikardo, Ian
Strang, Gavin


Hooson, Emlyn
Millan, Bruce
Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. R.


Horam, John
Miller, Dr. M. S.
Summerskill, Hn. Dr. Shirley


Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Milne, Edward
Swain, Thomas


Howell, Denis (Small Heath)
Mitchell, R. C. (S'hampton, Itchen)
Taverne, Dick


Huckfield, Leslie
Molloy, William
Thomas, Rt. Hn. George (Cardiff, W.)


Hughes, Rt. Hn. Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)
Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)


Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Thomson, Rt. Hn. G. (Dundee, E.)


Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen, N.)
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Thorpe, Rt. Hn. Jeremy


Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Morris, Rt. Hn. John (Aberavon)
Tinn, James


Hunter, Adam
Moyle, Roland
Tomney, Frank


Irvine, Rt. Hn. Sir Arthur (Edge Hill)
Mulley, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Torney, Tom


Janner, Greville
Murray, Ronald King
Tuck, Raphael


Jay, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Oakes, Gordon
Urwin, T. W.


Jeger, Mrs. Lena
Ogden, Eric
Varley, Eric G.


Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
O'Halloran, Michael
Wainwright, Edwin


Jenkins, Rt. Hn. Roy (Stechford)
O'Malley, Brian
Walden, Brian (B'm'ham, All Saints)


John, Brynmor
Oram, Bert
Walker, Harold (Doncaster)


Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)
Orbach, Maurice
Wallace, George


Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)
Orme, Stanley
Watkins, David


Johnson, Walter (Derby, S.)
Oswald, Thomas
Weitzman, David


Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Owen, Dr. David (Plymouth, Sutton)
Wellbeloved, James


Jones, Barry (Flint, E.)
Palmer, Arthur
Wells, William (Walsall, N.)


Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles
White, James (Glasgow, Pollok)


Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn (W. Ham, S.)
Pardoe, John
Whitehead, Phillip


Jones, Gwynoro (Carmarthen)
Parker, John (Dagenham)



Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, W.)
Parry, Robert (Liverpool, Exchange)
Whitlock, William


Judd, Frank
Pavitt, Laurie
Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick


Kaufman, Gerald
Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred
Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)


Kelley, Richard
Pendry, Tom
Williams, Mrs. Shirley (Hitchin)


Kerr, Russell
Pentland, Norman
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Kinnock, Neil
Perry, Ernest G.



Lambie, David
Prentice, Rt. Hn. Reg.
Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)


Lamond, James
Prescott, John
Wilson, Rt. Hn. Harold (Huyton)


Lawson, George
Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)
Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)


Leadbitter, Ted
Price, William (Rugby)
Woof, Robert


Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Probert, Arthur



Leonard, Dick
Rankin, John
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Lestor, Miss Joan
Reed, D. (Sedgefield)
Mr. Ernest Armstrong and


Lever, Rt. Hn. Harold
Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)
 Mr. Joseph Harper.



Rhodes, Geoffrey

Resolved,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty thanking Her Majesty for the Most Gracious Message sent on Her behalf and communicating to this House that Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother and Her Royal Highness the Princess Margaret Countess of Snowdon, to whom had been delegated certain Royal Functions as specified

in Letters Patent dated the 4th day of February 1972, had deemed it proper by Proclamation, made on Her Majesty's behalf and in pursuance of he Emergency Powers Act 1920, as amended by the Emergency Powers Act 1964, and dated 9th February 1972, to declare that a state of emergency exists.

To be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of Her Majesty's Household.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Ordered,
That the Transport (Grants) Bill may be proceeded with at this day's Sitting, though opposed, until any hour.—[The Prime Minister.]

Orders of the Day — EMERGENCY POWERS

10.13 p.m.

The Attorney-General (Sir Peter Rawlinson): I beg to move,
That the Regulations made by Order in Council under the Emergency Powers Act 1920 and date 9th February, 1972, a copy of which was laid before this House on 9th February, shall continue in force, subject however to the provisions of Section 2(4) of the said Act.
The House having decided on the main issue of the granting of emergency powers, the Emergency Powers Emergency Regulations, 1972, are the regulations designed and provided for in the Act to maintain the essentials of the life of the community at large in a situation of emergency. As the House well knows, such regulations give the Government powers, some of which they may or may not use, in order to maintain those essentials.
The House will be familiar with the general form which such regulations take. In 1966, at the time of the seamen's dispute, and in 1970 in this Parliament with the docks strike, the House had general regulations before it. They were referred to by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, who spoke of the groupings of the regulations and described their effect. I shall return to that. But there are certain alterations in the present regulations, as there were alterations in the regulations of 1970 compared with those of 1966, and I shall bring the attention of the House to those.
In 1970 there were five new regulations compared with those of 1966, and these were the regulations which appear now under the present regulations. Regulation No. 3 relates to the directions that can be given to ships and the movement in harbour of craft. That was new in 1970, as was Regulation No. 4 dealing with the movement of ships and of other vessels such as hovercraft. Regulation No. 15 was different from that of 1966,

by relaxing regulations with regard to the conveyance by road of petroleum and similar kinds of dangerous materials. Regulation No. 26 gave the power to hire coaches and oblige them to carry passengers under directions. Regulation No. 28 gave power to regulate conditions for the carrying of passengers in ships.
Those were the main changes made in 1970. I now draw the attention of the House to further changes that have been made. As the House will appreciate, when emergency powers have been granted and emergency regulations are introduced, they give very extensive powers. It is only right to point out to the House where there have been changes from those which the House has previously considered, for instance, in 1970.
Regulation No. 11 is different from that of 1970. That is new. It provides for the Secretary of State for the Environment to exempt drivers from complying with the law relating to permitted hours and periods of duty, and other procedural matters. It may be necessary for drivers to drive for longer hours in emergency circumstances and, therefore, the Minister is given power by order to exempt drivers from the permitted hours regulations. This power has not yet been exercised.
Then there are the important Regulations Nos. 17 and 18—replacing the previous single Regulation No. 16—dealing with both public utilities, and they give to the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry new powers for regulating or prohibiting the consumption of electricity and gas. Under Regulations Nos. 17 and 18, the details of which I shall come to shortly, the Secretary of State is empowered to authorise persons to act on his behalf, in particular, to enter premises, if necessary by force.

Mr. Arthur Lewis: Regarding the regulation concerning drivers' hours, etc., can the Attorney-General say whether the regulation gives authority for lorries to be unlicensed and uninsured and if, as is the case, some of the lorries have been untaxed and uninsured, may I assume that that is at present illegal and could not be done legally? Will the Attorney-General take some action on that matter?

The Attorney-General: I will take action if the hon. Gentleman sends me evidence of any offences having been committed. I will certainly see that that matter is considered.
Regulation No. 11, which I was dealing with, deals with drivers' permitted hours and means that there can be exempted the obligation of a driver to drive for only certain hours and keep records of the hours he drives. Under the 1968 Act, he can drive for only a limited number of hours. This regulation provides that the Minister may give these directions He has not done so yet.
Regulation No. 17 is necessary because, in particular, of the nature of this emergency, which affects principally the supply of electricity and gas. Under this regulation there is power to give directions to industry. It is under this regulation that orders have been made by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, to which he referred earlier. These are specific orders to specific consumers. As my right hon. Friend said, about 20,000 have been issued. They regulate the hours during which a person or company to whom the order is directed may consume electricity. This relates to industry.
The Secretary of State is empowered to authorise persons to act on his behalf and to enter, if necessary by force, industrial premises to see if there has been any contravention of any direction which has been given to cut off the electricity. This is to ensure that persons comply with such orders.
The penalties provided in the regulation are only a fine of £100 or a suspended sentence for a first offence. Therefore, there must be some effective powers of entry to see if there has been a contravention or to cut off the supply if, but only if, there is a reluctant or recalcitrant consumer. It is an important power and is very relevant in this emergency.

Mr. Arthur Palmer: The right hon. and learned Gentleman has referred to these as important powers. Surely they are drastic powers—to enter into a house in this way by force. Who are to be entrusted with these powers? Are they to be officers of the electricity

boards and are they to have special authorisation from the Secretary of State?

The Attorney-General: I thought that I had made it clear that the orders made under this regulation are directed to industry and industrial premises and not to houses. I will come to Regulation No. 21, which provides for the making of orders with regard to shops or offices or, if they were to be made, domestic premises. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that these are drastic powers. This is why, although it may be wearisome for the House, I think it is always important for the House, when there are such regulations and when the Executive is given such powers, that there should be an explanation of the detail of the Regulations.

Mr. Palmer: Will the Attorney-General answer my question? I asked whether the powers are to be given to an officer of the electricity board and whether he is to have a special authorisation.

The Attorney-General: I was answering the first part of the hon. Gentleman's question, because the hon. Gentleman had said that the power was one to enter a house. I was explaining that the power was not to enter a house and that it is a power to enter industrial premises.
Regulation 17(5) says:
The Secretary of State may authorise any person acting on his behalf …".
The Secretary of State must personally authorise that person to act on his behalf if there is to be an entry in the circumstances I have mentioned.

Sir Harmar Nicholls: Did my right hon. and learned Friend say that a warning would be given before steps would be taken to bring a case to court?

The Attorney-General: No. I was dealing solely with the power the Secretary of State has to authorise anybody to enter industrial premises and there to see whether there has been a contravention, or even to cut off the electricity. Regulation No. 18 relates to gas supply, and obviously safety considerations apply there. Regulation No. 17 is a power to enter premises and see whether there has been any contravention, then to cut off the supply, and, if there should be


an offence, the authorised person would have to give notice of the fact that he had found that there was a contravention of the regulation. Then there would be proceedings, notice of which would have to be served on the person who had allegedly been guilty of breaching the regulation.

Mr. Charles Loughlin: Regulation No. 17(5) provides:
The Secretary of State may authorise any person acting on his behalf to enter any premises…
My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, Central (Mr. Palmer) asked specifically whether it is the Secretary of State's intention to invest these powers to an individual employer by the electricity board or by the police. Could the right hon. and learned Gentleman indicate whether it is a member of the electricity board or, if not, who is it?

The Attorney-General: The hon. Gentleman has carefully read out the provisions set out under Regulation No. 17(5). The Secretary of State may authorise any person acting on his behalf to enter premises. Clearly, someone acting on his behalf would be some person whom he directs and not an ordinary constable. It would be somebody authorised on his behalf who would have to have his direct authority so to carry out the duties.
These powers and regulations are always serious, drastic and important and they are given at times of emergency to the Executive. This provides a legal framework for the restriction of the use of electricity by industry initially on certain specified days in each week. In general terms, Regulation No. 17 is not to be used to impose restrictions on other than individual industrial consumers. The power of entry is restricted to Regulation No. 17 and, as we shall see, Regulation No. 18. The Secretary of State must himself authorise the persons to exercise these powers. As I have said, this regulation is directed to a particular individual industrial concern classified as falling within a group. It recites that there is a prohibition on consuming or permitting the consumption of electricity on named days for any purpose other than those set out.
Regulation No. 18 is framed on similar lines but it is not to be applied in the same manner. A power of entry can be exercised by a person other than the Secretary of State if given that power by the Secretary of State. The reason is that a gas board might have to be given these powers to ensure public safety, and that is a very compelling reason that they should be so given.
Regulation No. 21 was included in the 1966 and 1970 regulations. It is under this regulation that orders have already been made to restrict, for instance, advertising by the use or the consumption of electricity, floodlighting, and non-domestic heating—that is, heating in offices and shops. But with Regulation No. 21 there is no power of entry because these are general directions. It is only when there is a specific direction under Regulation No. 17 or Regulation No. 18 that the power of entry exists.
To come back to Regulation No. 19, I feel that I should draw the attention of the House to this because it is a new regulation. It replaces the old Regulation No. 17, extending it to river authorities exercising their function under the Water Resources Act, 1963, to disregard certain statutory obligations. It is normally an absolute duty which can, however, be obviated now by Regulation No. 19.
Regulations No. 25 and No. 26 extend to rail, stating what may be carried by rail and at whose direction.
Regulation No. 39 is the only other alteration from the regulations which the House debated in 1970, and it is a more convenient drafting way of making the general provisions.
I have brought to the attention of the House those differences between the 1966, 1970 and 1972 regulations. In the case of 13 of those regulations the powers are basically, and in most respects wholly, those which successive Governments have sought and obtained in circumstances of national emergency, and the Government will retain those powers for as long, but only as long, as the emergency exists. The powers are imperative in order to maintain the life of the community.

10.30 p.m.

Mr. Anthony Wedgwood Benn: I hope that the


Attorney-General will not think me discourteous when I say that, in our judgment, the regulations should have been presented not as a legal problem but as giving the Government the opportunity to say how they intend to protect the community in the state of emergency which now confronts us. Now that the previous Division is over and done with, and the House has accepted that an emergency exists, we must look at these regulations not really as an exercise in legal draftsmanship but as the main instrument available to the Government to deal with the crisis the gravity of which the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry made clear in his speech winding up the debate on the emergency powers. It is strange that the regulations have been presented by the Attorney-General and not by the Minister who signed them.

The Attorney-General: It has always been the custom—indeed, it has been the wish and demand of the House—that regulations which give the Executive such powers should at least have their legal implications pointed out by the Attorney-General of the day. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman recalls that that has been the custom.

Mr. Benn: I am not grumbling about the availability of the Attorney-General to deal with questions. I should not grumble if the Attorney-General had held himself available to deal with legal problems raised by hon. Members in the debate. But this is not a precautionary debate, as many have been about emergency regulations in the past. We are now, as the Secretary of State made clear, in a serious situation. Having had a whole day's debate, ranging over the handling of the miners' dispute, to which I do not wish now to refer, the House and the country must take the opportunity of this 1½ hours' debate to ask the Government how they propose to handle the emergency which they have described. The powers which the Government wish to take under these regulations are very wide, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman said; and the way in which we must regard them depends upon the use which the Government intend to make of them.
Only two orders have been made under the emergency regulations, and one direc

tion has been given. It is in order to comment on these orders, because the regulations themselves are the superior authority. The first comment which I make is that we regard the orders which have been made as quite unsatisfactory, on the ground, first, that there was no foresight or adequate consultation with those most likely to be concerned. I do not wish to continue the debate which the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry wound up a few minutes ago, but it is inconceivable that this question of foresight could pass without some reference to what the right hon. Gentleman himself said seven days ago.
At Question Time last Monday, my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, Central (Mr. Palmer) asked:
Does the right hon. Gentleman appreciate just how serious is the public electricity system at this moment? It is balanced on a knife-edge. Does he not think that the Government bear some responsibility for the situation by their foolhardy policy of discrimination against the nationalised industries in the matter of pay settlements?
The Secretary of State replied:
No. I do not agree with that remark at all.
That was seven days ago today. I asked the right hon. Gentleman then:
In view of the gravity of the crisis, to which reference has been made, does the right hon. Gentleman recognise that the Government cannot stand aside from this matter, particularly as they are known to be a major factor in the background of all the negotiations?
He replied:
The Government are keeping the whole issue under careful and continuous attention and will take any action which they deem necessary in the light of any development"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th February, 1972; Vol. 830, c. 948.]

Sir Harmar Nicholls: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Is what the right hon. Gentleman is saying in order? It looks as though we are continuing the debate on principle. That has been concluded, and I thought we were debating the regulations in detail. I had hoped that the Opposition would want to probe the wording so that we would know their effect. Merely to continue the last debate for propaganda purposes is a misuse of parliamentary time.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Miss Harvie Anderson): I am grateful to the hon.


Gentleman, but the Chair will look after the conduct of the debate.

Mr. Benn: I am grateful for that Ruling, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am not seeking to continue the discussion about the miners' dispute. I am considering whether the Government exercised a sensible foresight in the preparation of the regulations and the orders made under them. That is what the present debate is about.
I refer now to what was said on Friday after the Secretary of State's statement. The Association of British Chambers of Commerce sent him a telegram saying:
All chambers of commerce deplore the lack of prior consultation about severe power cuts announced by you in the House today. Moreover this inadequate notice limits opportunity to plan, especially as cuts could be on intermittent days. This is an unnecessary additional handicap to production. Telephone and telex messages show much resentment.
This is a reference to the way in which the Secretary of State has made orders already under the emergency powers. There is no doubt that from the point of view of the Prime Minister's speech on Friday night the statement made on Friday morning had maximum political effect.
The question we are debating is whether the regulations were drafted and conceived to minimise the damage done to industry under the emergency powers. Without going into all the industries affected, I think the House should know, and anyone who has followed the Press comment will know already, that certain continuous-process industries are very badly hit indeed by the regulations and orders that were made without any consultation. In the steel industry there has been the effect on Consett and Hartle-pools. The British Steel Corporation may well have to lay off over 10.000 men by the middle of the week. The chemical industry and the brickmaking industry are hit. The blast furnaces are affected. The Invergordon and Anglesey smelters are seriously affected. The glass works in Irvine in Scotland, which is referred to in the Financial Times today, is faced with the danger of having to be rebuilt if it is denied the fuel it needs. That could take 12 months, and 500 jobs would meanwhile be at stake. I.C.I., Runcorn, where chlorine is produced, is seriously threatened. It is estimated

today that the effect on the train services will cost British Rail about £30 million, in addition to the £100 million that may be the cost to the Coal Board itself. In the motor industry, half the Leyland 64,000 workers are likely to be laid off. Vauxhall at Luton has closed. Lucas has 21,000 people affected by the rotation of cuts. The National Farmers Union has commented on the effect on milk and food.
All these things follow from the orders made, made without any consultation with industry whatsoever. I understand that the Minister for Industry has spent part of the day discussing these matters with industry, which has alternative arrangements it would like to put forward for the handling of the rationing of fuel supplies. I hope the hon. Gentleman will be able to say something about the extent to which he has been able to move to meet the needs of industry. If fuel supplies are as short as the Secretary of State said, it is essential that those who are using electricity should have the opportunity of commenting on how that electricity should be shared out.
The second area I want to open up is that these regulations gave the Government a great deal of power to deal with what other people do. They can amend legislation affecting drivers' hours, for example, and they give power of entry to premises. We want some account of how the Government intend to react to the situation directly within their own power.
I want to mention the work of four Departments which are clearly affected and which give reason to believe that the Government have been wholly lacking in adequate preparatory work. The first is the Department of Trade and Industry itself.
The information services set up by the D.T.I., and advertised by printing four or five addresses in the newspapers, have been totally overwhelmed by the number of business firms ringing up for information. Indeed, the telephone numbers were not even printed in the Press, no doubt to make it just that little more difficult for firms which wanted adequate answers to get them. Is the Department now satisfied that its information centres are going to be not only continually manned on a 24-hour basis but able to


provide the answers that many firms, including small firms, are anxious to get?
Next, there is the Department of Employment. I think it highly significant that the Financial Times today made clear that the Secretary of State did not want workers to report to employment exchanges but to make contact with their own employers and let them handle it. This decision has two consequences. The first is that it gives the employers, at this moment of acute difficulty, the responsibility for calculating and registering all those who are likely to be affected by electricity cuts. At this moment, when employers and managements are heavily burdened, the Government say to the workers, "Don't bother us. Go to your own employers."
The second serious consequence, I understand, is that today is the day on which certain counts are made throughout the country to give an idea of how many people are temporarily stopped. By putting it out today that those affected by electricity cuts were not to go to the employment exchanges, the Department has made sure that the House will have figures which are not perhaps accurate accounts of how many people are temporarily stopped as a result of the dispute. These two factors represent very serious defects in the Department.
There is yet another aspect in which the Department of Employment is involved. It is normal when people are to be laid off because of an impending redundancy for the Department to set up special centres in the firms likely to be affected. I recall many cases when the Department set up such centres when redundancies were likely in order in those cases to help people find other work. Are the Government going to adopt this practice in order to get an accurate record of the number temporarily stopped as a result of the dispute?
Still another aspect of the Department's work was raised earlier today by my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams), who asked the Secretary of State about the implications of the Industrial Relations Act on the possible provisions for balloting in the event of the N.U.M. deciding to put the issue before its members as a whole.
I had another question concerning Regulation No. 32—and this is why I wish

the Attorney-General had spoken at the end of this debate. I want an assurance from him about Regulation No. 32, which says:
No person shall trespass on, or on premises in the vicinity of, any premises used or appropriated for the purposes of essential services; and if any person is found trespassing on any premises in contravention of this paragraph, then, without prejudice to any proceedings which may be taken against him, he may be removed by the appropriate person from the premises.
Is Regulation No. 32 to have any bearing on the picketing situation as explained by the Home Secretary in a series of answers to the House last week? I should like an authoritative answer from the Minister on that matter before the debate concludes.

The Attorney-General: I would draw the right hon. Gentleman's attention to Regulation No. 37 which says:
Provided that a person shall not be guilty of an offence against any of these Regulations by reason only of his taking part in, or peacefully persuading any other person or persons to take part in, a strike.
That clearly keeps alive the right peacefully to picket. Therefore, peaceful picketing does not permit of trespass of loitering or anything provided for in Regulation No. 32, but Regulation No. 37 provides that the position of a person peacefully picketing remains as it is under the present law.

Mr. Benn: I am grateful to the Attorney-General for clarifying the point, and I am the more pleased that I put it. At the same time, this was not clear unless specifically explained. Therefore, this—plus the references he has given—will be of value in case Regulation No. 32 is wrongly thought by some to constitute some limitation on the power of peaceful picketing.
I turn to deal with the Department of Health and Social Security. This is another Government responsibility, and we must know what action the Government are to take faced with the possibility of massive weekly payments for those who have been temporarily stopped as a result of the dispute. Figures were given last week suggesting that the cost involved might be £20 million a week. I am not concerned with the figures at this moment. I am concerned to know whether the Government intend to tell


the House tonight what plans they have made to see that the payments are made to all those who are eligible, many of whom may be in urgent need.
I turn from central government to the problems of the local authorities. I should like to refer to what the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry said last Monday, when talking about the coal dispute in particular:
The Government will pay careful regard to the needs of pensioners and others who for various reasons rely greatly on these supplies."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th February, 1972; Vol. 830, c. 973.]
Hearing that answer, I expected that if the Government came forward with any emergency regulations they would also have specific plans for dealing with that category of people. However, when I looked at the Government's advertisement in all newspapers today I saw the following, under the heading "Elderly people":
There will be some elderly people who may find it difficult to cope. The welfare sections of local authorities will be active but, even so, if you know of elderly people nearby please contact them to make sure they are all right.
I have no complaint about that request—and indeed we have made it ourselves in another context today—to people such as voluntary organisations to help. But there is no reference here to the Government using the enormous powers given to them by their own regulations to assist local authorities, to provide money for local authorities, to authorise local authorities to undertake what is probably one of the most difficult rescue operations they have ever been confronted with.
It would be wrong of us to pass these regulations until we have had a clear statement, either from the Minister in winding un the debate or from the Home Secretary if he wishes to intervene, to tell us how the old, the sick and the disabled are to be carried through this difficult period. There is the need for a proper register for money to be made available for help. We have no idea what the Government are doing in response to the Secretary of State's clear pledge that they will pay careful regard to the needs of pensioners.
As any hon. Member who has large blocks of flats in his constituency knows

very well, older people living in those blocks of flats are isolated in any circumstances. But, without heating and without the lifts not working, there will be some people virtually imprisoned in those large blocks of flats, unless the Government are taking the trouble to see that the local authorities are in touch with them and are taking them food, as the Government have the power to do under these regulations.
There is the co-ordination of the work of voluntary organisations. My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Gorbals (Mr. McElhone) has done a survey in his constituency of all the chronically sick and disabled there, encouraged by the Private Members' Bill which my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Alfred Morris) introduced to the House. But in many parts of the country there still is not a register of these isolated people. There are the fifth and sixth formers who are not able to go to school because heating is not available in schools. Local authorities should not only be encouraged but given the authority and necessary money to get these youngsters out on the job of locating and helping people who live alone. The miners are making their soup kitchens available to old-age pensioners in areas where pickets are situated. I heard of this in the North-East when I was there on Saturday. The Government have made no comparable provision to help people confronted with the situation.
Even in the emergency handling of this crisis, the Government have shown themselves to be remote, aloof and incompetent. There was no foresight by the Minister of the consequences which would flow from the situation. There was no consultation, not even with his own organisation, the C.B.I. There was no report to this House on the machinery that right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite have set up within the Government. They simply present regulations which give them power to tell others what to do. There is no evidence so far of necessary help for local authorities to be able to deal with the consequences of the situation.
These regulations and the orders made under them do not inspire any confidence. The Government appear still to prefer confrontation to co-operation in this matter, too. For these reasons, I very


much hope that the House will not find itself able to accept these regulations until the Government come forward with full answers to all the questions that I have put and to all the many others which are in the minds of the public at the moment.

10.52 p.m.

Sir Harmar Nicholls: It is obvious that the decision having been given earlier that there was a necessity, because of the problem facing the nation, to have emergency regulations, the House must proceed to give the powers that naturally flow from the vote taken less than an hour ago.
I suppose that the approach of the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) was typical. I resented one part of it, because it showed a mind which I do not think is in keeping with the standard that a Member of Parliament should have. When he found some twisted reason for an employer making representations on behalf of all his employees to avoid the employment exchanges being crowded, with all the difficulties and problems which would flow from it—

Mr. Thomas Swain: They are crowded already.

Sir Harmar Nicholls: I found myself agreeing with the right hon. Gentleman when he first drew attention to it, because it puts extra responsibilities on managements and employers at a difficult time. But then I realised that that was not the right hon. Gentleman's reason. He had some dirty-minded suggestion that this was being done because my right hon. Friends wanted to cook the books about the number of people unemployed on a certain date. This is an unreasonable attitude, and a sad one—

Mr. Benn: The hon. Gentleman cannot have been listening to me. I said that the Government had asked employers to assume this extra duty on this day and that it would have the effect of denying to the public the full knowledge of the number of people temporarily stopped. That is what I said: no more, and no less. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw his suggestion.

Sir Harmar Nicholls: If what the right hon. Gentleman said does not mean what I have suggested, it means nothing. Un

less it means what I have said, there is no point in making the comment. The right hon. Gentleman should face that or withdraw his words.
I intervene at this stage only to make a plea on behalf of small businesses and small industries. The right hon. Gentleman and others make speeches in support of big industries which are capable of looking after themselves. Usually they do not want guidance, any more than the big unions do. They have internal advisers. They know what they are doing. Usually they have resources to get themselves over periods of emergency. But the tens of thousands of small businesses which will be affected by the present emergency situation have not the same backing and organisation with which to look after themselves.
The plea that I make to my right hon. Friend and to any Department which will be implementing the emergency regulations is to show consideration for the uncertainty and misunderstanding that is bound to exist in the minds of people who run small businesses and small industries. I should like to feel that instructions will be given to give warnings before applying the full rigidity of any fines or action in the courts which may flow from a disregard of these regulations. I should like to feel that the approach will be that people will be warned first, and then, if they disregard a clear warning that can be clearly understood, the full force of the penalties that arise from the regulations will be applied. Unless this matter is approached in that kind of spirit, then, as is always the case, it will be those tens of thousands of small business men and small industrialists, who have not the same facilities as others, who will be dragged before the courts and will carry all the odium and the difficulties which flow from these essential emergency regulations.
I will not take up the time of the House any longer. There is not, under our procedures as they stand, a great deal of time to discuss these regulations. However, I should like some assurance that this sympathetic approach to an understanding of the real uncertainties which will follow will be taken whilst implementing the emergency regulations.

10.57 p.m.

Mr. Charles Loughlin: I want to bring the House


back to Regulations 31 to 37, to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) made a passing reference. I appreciate that the second part of Regulation 37(1), as the Attorney-General said, to some extent excludes people who are engaging peacefully in a strike. But these regulations are about the miners' strike. Looking at the whole of the wording, from Regulation 31 to Regulation 37, it is clear what the effect of that part of Regulation 37(1) is likely to be.
I ask the House to look, for example. at Regulation 35:
Where a constable, with reasonable cause, suspects that an offence against any of these Regulations has been committed, he may arrest without warrant".
Again, it is important from the miners' point of view to look at Regulation 31:
No person shall do any act with intent to impair the efficiency or impede the working or movement of any vessel".
What consolation is Regulation 37 to miners who go down to the docks to exercise their legitimate right to picket? What we are seeing, and what we are likely to see in future, is an increasing volume of coal imports. In a situation where the coal industry supplies 75 per cent. of our energy requirements, the only way that the Government can defeat the miners, if there is a continuance of the strike, is by the importation of coal from the Continent of Europe. We are being asked to place in jeopardy miners who will want to picket ships in order to prevent the importation of coal. I do not want to discuss the pros and cons of the dispute and the validity or otherwise of the miners' strike. I support them 100 per cent. and, bearing in mind their record over the last 10 years, I do not know how any hon. Gentleman opposite can oppose them.
One of the most disappointing things for me in the previous debate was the absence of sympathy and reality in the speeches from the benches opposite. We are faced with an intense struggle by the miners, and they will not be particularly concerned about legal niceties. They will not ask "If I say 'bloody' am I out of court?". They will not ask, "If I use my hands, am I peacefully picketing, or is there a likelihood of my being charged with something other than peaceful picketing?".
This is an extremely emotional situation, charged with every passion that one can think of. Men will go down to the docks to try to stop the importation of coal. Regulation 35 gives rise to the possibility of a constable deciding that he has reasonable cause to arrest one or more miners. I invite the attention of the House to Regulations 32, 33 and 34. One can visualise the situation at the docks, at a power station, or anywhere else, of a constable, thinking that he has "reasonable cause"—those are the words in Regulation 35—for arresting someone.
Does anybody imagine that if Joe Gormley were arrested—[Interruption.]—It ought to be put on record that the hon. Member for Peterborough (Sir Harmar Nicholls) said that that would not be a bad idea. The hon. Gentleman hoped that his comment would not get on the record.

Sir Harmar Nicholls: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Loughlin: I shall give way in a moment. The hon. Gentleman made his comment sotto voce in the hope that it would not get on the record. He cannot get away with that. He said it, and now he want to qualify it.

Sir Harmar Nicholls: As always, the hon. Gentleman is too clever by half. The hon. Gentleman was describing the situation of somebody at the docks not picketing peacefully and a constable taking the view that that person is in breach of the law. If someone is in breach of the law he ought to be brought up for that, and that applies whether it is Joe Gormley or the hon. Gentleman himself.

Mr. Loughlin: The hon. Gentleman wanted to put Joe Gormley in jail. Now he has not the guts to stand up for what he said. He did not even listen because I am well away from the ship now. I have got to Regulation No. 32, 33, 34. I do not suppose the hon. Gentleman has read them. No matter where the alleged breach takes place, once miners are arrested in anything like large numbers there will not be the ghost of a chance of getting them back to work. We are not dealing with power workers or the Post Office workers.

The Minister for Industry (Sir John Eden): The hon. Gentleman is making


great play of some of the words of the regulations. He was a member of the Government in 1966 at the time of the seamen's strike and no doubt will recollect that Regulations Nos. 26, 27 and 28 at that time are almost word for word as set down here. No doubt he supported those quite openly.

Mr. Loughlin: According to the hon. Gentleman I have been hoist with my own petard. He is a relatively junior Minister—it is no good him smiling about it—and he will learn that individual members of a Government will not necessarily personally accept the policy for which they are collectively responsible. That is a charlatan's trick. If he has been in Government five months he knows that he has accepted collective responsibility for a decision with which he disagrees. He can always resign—that is true—but if that were done there would be resignations every day of the week. I am dealing with life as it is. The danger in applying these regulations to this strike is enormous because we are dealing with closed communities, and if there are wholesale arrests the miners will never go back to work. It would be better for the Government not to apply this part of the regulations if there is this danger.

11.10 p.m.

Mr. Leslie Spriggs: I follow my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucestershire, West (Mr. Loughlin) in his reference to Supplemental Regulation No. 35, which deals with a constable's power to arrest without warrant, and provides that
Where a constable, with reasonable cause, suspects that an offence against any of these Regulations has been committed, he may arrest without warrant anyone whom he, with reasonable cause, suspects to be guilty of the offence.
There is no need for this regulation. If a person breaks the law a constable—or, indeed, an ordinary citizen—already has power to arrest him without warrant.
When the Secretary of State was speaking I interjected, and I got a fair amount of information about illegal picketing. I want to put it on record that the miners who have been picketing the Fiddlers Ferry power station, at Sutton Manor, in my constituency, have been doing so completely legally. The Minister's refer

ence to the old and the sick—and the hospital—having to go without fuel supplies is completely untrue in relation to my area. The Minister should withdraw what he said about the miners refusing to allow the old and the sick to obtain fuel supplies. I witnessed picketing miners visiting houses occupied by sick and old people who were without fuel and seeing that coal was delivered within hours. I received an assurance that hospitals requiring fuel would get their supplies at the instance of the National Union of Mineworkers.
When the Minister referred to illegal practices being carried out by certain groups I drew his attention to the fact that a few miners were due to appear at the Newton-le-Willows magistrates' court next Wednesday morning on a police charge, and that the case was sub judice. It was very unfair for the Minister to refer to illegal practices of pickets in a case like that. I suggest to the Government and the Law Officers that in view of what the Minister said this afternoon, serious consideration should now be given to the withdrawal of those summonses.
One or two hon. Members opposite attacked the miners' case. Quite unjustly, one hon. Member suggested that it was wrong for hon. Members on this side of the House to divide the nation on this matter. I remind the House that the Government have already divided the nation on the matter. They did so when they applied the 7 per cent. norm to the public sector of industry. Comparing what has taken place in wage negotiations in the private sector with the 7 per cent. norm imposed for the public sector, we are driven to the conclusion that it amounts to a directive to the public boards to resist any claims above the 7 per cent. norm. It is clear that the board dare not go above the 7 per cent. norm—8 per cent. at the most—without the consent of the Government.
Hon. Gentlemen opposite who attack the miners' case do not understand that case. Anybody with experience of the industry appreciates, for example, the economic necessity for coal and the dangers involved in winning it. I do not know one miner out of the 1,800 in my constituency who does not suffer from a lung disease of one sort or another. Miners should be put on a par from the


reward point of view with workers in similarly dangerous occupations.
Britain is one of the few countries in the world which treats its miners so shabbily. On a recent tour of the Soviet Union I questioned Ministers there about their approach to industrial matters of this kind. I discovered that the wages and working conditions of Russian miners are on a par with those of doctors. Indeed, I was informed that it was possible for miners to earn more than doctors. There is nothing wrong with that.
In a recent speech the Prime Minister referred to what he called the inflationary tendency of high wage claims. But why do workers submit frequent wage claims? Consider, for example, the last Rent Act. An old-age pensioner who lives alone in a flat in my constituency received a notice at the beginning of this year informing her that her present rent of £106 a year, inclusive of rates, would go up as from 1st April, 1972, to £11·60 a month exclusive of rates, to £14·70 exclusive as from 1st April, 1973; to £17·50 exclusive as from 1st April, 1974; to £20·90 exclusive as from 1st April, 1975; and to £24 exclusive of rates as from 1st April, 1976.
It should not be difficult for economists to find out why the workers go on claiming wage increases. Everyone knows that the real value of wages is being eaten away by such increases as I have just quoted. School children's milk used to be free; from children of the age of 7 and upwards free milk has been withdrawn. School meal charges have gone up. Every housewife knows that the price of almost every item in the shops has gone up about three times in the last twelve months. I have taken a particular interest in English cheeses, and I know that one famous firm, which I will not now name, has three times increased the price of its English cheese.
When the miners put in their claim they were fully justified because not one of them was being paid an economic wage for the job he was doing. There is no-one here, not even those hon. Members who are ex-miners, who would enjoy going back into the industry for the money being paid. The case for the miners is undeniable, and it is wicked that we should now have on our hands a strike that no-one wants—not even the miners, until they were forced out on to the streets.
The propaganda being directed against the miners is that because of the strike the old, the sick and others are not getting their fuel. The fact is that in my part of the world the miners on picket duty are seeing that every known pensioner, everyone suffering from sickness which imprisons him in his own home, and the local hospitals right up to the Merseyside are getting their fuel supplies, because our miners are compassionate.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. This debate must finish at 11.42 p.m., and I understand that the Minister wishes to catch my eye at 11.30 p.m. Mr. Heffer.

11.24 p.m.

Mr. Eric S. Heffer: In the few minutes that are available to me I have one or two things to say about picketing. I am very glad that the Home Secretary has come into the Chamber, because he said earlier that the miners were perfectly within the law. That is quite true. But on the 28th of this month the law on picketing changes with the coming into operation of Section 134 of the Industrial Relations Act. That Measure continues the present law in all respects but one; in the normally accepted sense of the word the picketing of people's homes is prohibited.
But Section 98 of the Industrial Relations Act makes the legal position different on the question of anyone inducing a person to break a contract of employment. That Section could well be used after 28th February. The Minister should answer this specific point. These regulations could well be used in conjunction with Section 98 of the Industrial Relations Act, which comes into operation from 28th February. We should know precisely what the Government have in mind about picketing after that date of power stations and similar places. If there is no settlement by that time, such places will still be picketed by the N.U.M. There will also be secondary action by the T.G.W.U. and workers who are supporting the miners in their struggle.
One point not answered by the Attorney-General when he replied to my right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) was that it was emphasised that anyone picketing peacefully about a strike would not be affected


by these regulations. But under Regulation 32 on trespassing and loitering, if the premises are designated as required for essential services—that could mean power stations—what would be the position of someone found loitering nearby if those peacefully picketing could nevertheless be classified as loitering?

The Attorney-General: It is categorically clear in the proviso of Section 37 that if someone is peacefully picketing any person or persons to take part in the strike, he will not be guilty of any offence included in any of these regulations. Therefore, it will not be an offence against these regulations, provided and if that person is doing what he is entitled lawfully to do: peacefully persuading any other persons to take part in a strike. That is the protection, which would mean that he could not be guilty of an offence under Section 32 if he were peacefully persuading a person to take part in a strike.

Sir Arthur Irvine: Is it not possible that it may be lawful under these regulations to remove a picket even though he has not committed any offence?

Mr. Heffer: I am grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend. I have only two minutes left. In reply to the Attorney-General, despite the fact that he has reiterated what Section 37 says, after the regulations are introduced and if a power station is designated for essential services, what is the position? It is no good the Attorney-General shaking his head. Governments do not introduce emergency regulations just because it is a nice thing to do. They introduce them to use them. That is why these regulations have been introduced.
It was suggested that that is what the Labour Government did in 1966. That is true. In 1966 some of us objected. We have objected to all these emergency regulations because we have believed that the answer is not to use repressive measures, not to introduce such regulations. The answer is to intervene in the sense of using proper industrial relations machinery to solve the dispute. That is why we have always taken the attitude that we should not introduce such emergency regulations, but should solve the

strike by using the existing machinery to bring those concerned to the negotiating table.
In Liverpool, the Clarence Dock Power Station—oil-fired and not picketed, with the oil arriving in tankers by sea—is not being used to capacity. This question has been raised with me by the workers at that power station. They suspect that orders have been given to this effect and that this is part of the development of a public attitude of mind against the miners. This is what the workers think. If it is not so, the Government should say so, because the workers suspect that the Government have only one intention, namely, to use whatever methods they can to break the miners.
I tell the Government now that, no matter what methods they use, they will not break the miners, because the miners have the united support of the workers. The miners will win. The quicker the Government recognise it and give the miners what they want instead of introducing nonsensical regulations of this type the better.

11.31 p.m.

The Minister for Industry (Sir John Eden): I am sorry that the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) found it necessary to take up the time of the House by making that last point which I am sure that he himself does not believe. He knows full well that there is no truth in it.

Mr. Heffer: Prove it.

Sir J. Eden: My right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General drew the attention of the House to the nature of the changes in these regulations from those which were presented to the House in previous emergencies. This enabled the House to consider these very important serious matters. I will try to answer the questions which have been asked by the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) and others. I want, first, to make it clear that the system of industrial restrictions which has been introduced has been dictated by the need to integrate them with the system of rota disconnections so as to ensure, so far as possible, that plants have interrupted electricity supply


on the days on which they are permitted to use it.
Second, that has given rise to the legal necessity for individual directions. That, in turn, has led to the consequence that each direction had to be delivered in a manner which could be proved in a court of law. Then there was the legal necessity to await the coming into force of the emergency regulations, as any steps taken earlier would have had no legal significance. Finally, the administrative impossibility in any short space of time of giving individual directions to all 200,000 industrial consumers will be apparent to every hon. Member. It was for this reason that it was decided to confine the industrial restrictions to the 20,000 consumers with load in excess of 100 megawatts. These 20,000 industrial consumers are responsible for about three-quarters of the industrial load.
A system which depends upon a legal directive must obviously involve some awkward problems of interpretation and, inevitably, some hard cases. The regional directors of the Department of Trade and Industry have discretion to deal with the problems that arise, and their offices have been open to deal with inquiries on Saturday and Sunday over the weekend and will remain so. The offices are fully manned. A substantial number of inquiries have been received, and so far as possible these have been answered straight away. This resulted in a number of adjustments being made to meet individual difficulties.
The right hon. Gentleman and others asked me about the question of consultation. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry explained that there had been very full consultation indeed. This has not been extended to the associations of chambers of commerce. This is purely for security reasons. It is difficult, in planning a matter of this kind, to extend the consultation too far, but I assure the House that there was proper consultation with the C.B.I. Various points were taken fully into account at the time of the preparation of our plans. The fact that the consultations were extensive is demonstrated by the number of representations that I had from particular industry sectors, especially from the continuous process users, even before the regula

tions came into force. Some of them were, in fact, already at that stage beginning to reduce the extent of their demand on the electricity supply system and beginning to reduce the heat that they were using.
The extent of the consultations was a matter also for the area electricity boards. One board, in fact, gave the full coverage to the whole of its 1,500 industrial consumers, but others have operated it on a more selective basis.
I think there are bound to be some rough edges in any statutory scheme of prohibition of this kind, but I assure the House that this has been constructed in as careful a way as possible. I can assure my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Sir Harmar Nicholls) that the position of small firms is very clearly understood in this case, and there is certainly no intention whatsoever—I think this is the phrase that he used—to drag people before the court. This will be carefully watched, and certainly the matter will be handled with sympathy and understanding.
The instance of the glass industry was cited by the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East. Where a company has a large load with direct metering, obviously it is subject to the specific direction which can arise from the identification which that fact allows. Otherwise such a company will become vulnerabe to the wholesale disconnections which are taking place additional to the normal sort of cuts which it might otherwise suffer.
I hasten to emphasise that there is absolutely nothing in the way in which this scheme is being operated which prevents them from using electricity to bring their plants safely to a standstill in order to preserve the plant. There has been some misunderstanding on this point, and I emphasise the fact now so as to ensure that those places in this situation know that they may continue to use electricity in order to bring their plant safely to a standstill where this is necessary.
The right hon. Gentleman also asked me about insufficient notice having been given. I think the difficulty here is simply the nature of the timing of the announcement of any decision to declare a state of emergency. Obviously, the moment having been chosen to do so, it


was naturally expected that there would follow up fairly soon thereafter the introduction of restrictions of this kind.

Mr. Benn: Were the actual arrangements that were made agreed with the industries at the time that the plans were laid?

Sir J. Eden: Not with each sector of industry. It was impossible to do that. It could not have been done. As far as possible, the major points were taken fully into account, particularly about continuous process users and others whose operations are very sensitive to interruptions of supply of this kind. This was done through the general processes which were available to us, in consultation with representatives on behalf of industry.
I come to the social questions which the right hon. Gentleman raised. I take, first, his accusation that there is some nefarious purpose behind the advice given to employees to turn to their employers at the present time rather than to the Social Security offices. There is no reason whatever to believe that there will be any interruption in the collection of statistics in this case. I have had that checked, as the right hon. Gentleman will have seen, I think. I shall follow it up in any case with my right hon. Friend afterwards. But so far as I have been able to find out during the course of the debate, there is absolutely no question that there will be any interruption.

It is primarily for the convenience of individual employees, who would otherwise have found themselves having to crowd into the offices on one particular day. It would have created a wholly impractical situation for the officers concerned in trying to deal with such a large number of persons temporarily displaced at that time. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman, having made the point, will recognise that there is no justification for it whatever.

As regards old people, there is absolutely no lack of power already vested in local authorities under the Local Authorities Social Services Act, 1970, to help those in need. The same Act enables authorities to co-ordinate the help available through voluntary organisations and societies, such as the W.R.V.S., and also the voluntary effort from groups of young people.

It has not been possible for me to cover all the points raised in the debate so far. I have authorised the publication today of the list of essential activities so that the country may identify those public services and other essential activities which are specifically ear-marked for special consideration at this time of emergency.

Question put:—

The House divided: Ayes 307, Noes 269.

Division No. 57.]
AYES
[11.43 p.m.


Adley, Robert
Brewis, John
Crouch, David


Allason, Michael (Barkston Ash)
Brinton, Sir Tatton
Crowder, F. P.


Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)
Brocklebank-Fowler, Christopher
Curran, Charles


Amery, Rt. Hn. Julian
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)
Davies, Rt. Hn. John (Knutsford)


Archer, Jeffrey (Louth)
Bruce-Gardyne, J.
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Hir Henry


Astor, John
Bryan, Paul
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Maj.-Gen, James


Atkins, Humphrey
Buchanan-Smith, Alick (Angus, N&amp;M)
Dean, Paul


Awdry, Daniel
Buck, Antony
Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F.


Baker, Kenneth (St. Marylebone)
Burden, F. A.
Digby, Simon Wingfield


Balniel, Lord
Butler, Adam (Bosworth)
Dixon, Piers


Batsford, Brian
Carlisle, Mark
Dodds-Parker, Douglas


Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton
Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert
Drayson, G. B.


Bell, Ronald
Channon, Paul
du Cann, Rt. Hn. Edward


Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torquay)
Chapman, Sydney
Dykes, Hugh


Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gosport)
Chataway, Rt. Hn. Christopher
Eden, Sir John


Benyon, W.
Chichester-Clark, R.
Edwards, Robert (Pembroke)


 Berry, Hn. Anthony
Churchill, W. S.
Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)


Biffen, John
Clark, William (Surrey, E.)
Elliott, R. W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)


Biggs-Davison, John
Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)
Emery, Peter


Blaker, Peter
Clegg, Walter
Farr, John


Boardman, H. (Leigh)
Cockeram, Eric
Fenner, Mrs. Peggy


Body, Richard
Cooke, Robert
Fidler, Michael


Boscawen, Robert
Coombs, Derek
Finsberg, Geoffrey (Hampstead)


Bossom, Sir Clive
Cordle, John
Fisher, Nigel (Surbiton)


Bowden, Andrew
Corfield, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Fletcher-Cooke, Charles


Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hn. John
Cormack, Patrick
Fookes, Miss Janet


Braine, Bernard
Costain, A. P.
Fortescue, Tim


Bray, Ronald
Critchley, Julian
Foster, Sir John




Fowler, Norman
Lloyd, Ian (P'tsm'th, Langstone)
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon


Fox, Marcus
Longden, Gilbert
Ridley, Hn. Nicholas


Fry, Peter
Loveridge, John
Ridsdale, Julian


Galbraith, Hn. T. G.
Luce, R. N.
Rippon, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey


Gardner, Edward
McAdden, Sir Stephen
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff, N.)


Gibson-Watt, David
MacArthur, Ian
Roberts, Wyn (Conway)


Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, C.)
McCrindle, R. A.
Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)


Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)
McLaren, Martin
Rost, Peter


Glyn, Dr. Alan
Maclean, Sir Fitzroy
Royle, Anthony


Godber, Rt. Hn. J. B.
McMaster, Stanley
Russell, Sir Ronald


Goodhart, Philip
Macmillan, Maurice (Farnham)
St. John-Stevas, Norman


Goodhew, Victor
McNair-Wilson, Michael
Sandys, Rt. Hn. D.


Gorst, John
McNair-Wilson, Patrick (New Forest)
Scott, Nicholas


Gower, Raymond
Maddan, Martin
Scott-Hopkins, James


Grant, Anthony (Harrow, C.)
Madel, David
Sharples, Richard


Gray, Hamish
Maginnis, John E.
Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh Whitby)


Green, Alan
Marples, Rt. Hn. Ernest
Shelton, William (Clapham)


Grieve, Percy
Marten, Neil
Simeons, Charles


Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)
Mather, Carol
Sinclair, Sir George


Grylls, Michael
Maude, Angus
Skeet, T. H. H.


Gummer, Selwyn
Maudling, Rt. Hn. Reginald
Smith, Dudley (W'wick &amp; L'mington)


Gurden, Harold
Mawby, Ray
Speed, Keith


Hall, Miss Joan (Keighley)
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
Spence, John


Hall, John (Wycombe)
Meyer, Sir Anthony
Sproat, Iain


Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Mills, Peter (Torrington)
Stainton, Keith


Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.)
Stanbrook, Ivor


Hannam, John (Exeter)
Miscampbell, Norman
Stewart-Smith, Geoffrey (Belper)


Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)
Mitchell, Lt.-Col. C.(Aberdeenshire, W)



Haselhurst, Alan
Mitchell, David (Basignstoke)
Stodart, Anthony (Edinburgh, W.)


Hastings, Stephen
Moate, Roger
Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M.


Havers, Michael
Molyneaux, James
Stokes, John


Hawkins, Paul
Money, Ernie
Stuttaford, Dr. Tom


Hay, John
Monks, Mrs. Connie
Sutcliffe, John


Hayhoe, Barney
Monro, Hector
Tapsell, Peter


Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward
Montgomery, Fergus
Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)


Heseltine, Michael
More, Jasper
Taylor, Edward M.(G'gow, Cathcart)


Hicks, Robert
Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)
Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)


Higgins, Terence L.
Morgan-Giles, Rear-Adm.
Taylor, Robert (Croydon, N.W.)


Hiley, Joseph
Morrison, Charles
Tebbit, Norman


Hill, John E. B. (Norfolk, S.)
Mudd, David
Temple, John M.


Hill, James (Southampton Test)
Murton, Oscar
Thatcher, Rt. Hn. Mrs. Margaret


Holland, Philip
Nabarro, Sir Gerald
Thomas, John Stradling (Monmouth)


Holt, Miss Mary
Neave, Airey
Thomas, Rt. Hn. Peter (Hendon, S.)


Hordern, Peter
Nicholls, Sir Harmar
Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)


Hornby, Richard
Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael
Tilney, John


Howe, Hn. Sir Geoffrey (Reigate)
Normanton, Tom
Trafford, Dr. Anthony


Howell, David (Guildford)
Noll, John
Trew, Peter


Howell, Ralph (Norfolk, N.)
Onslow, Cranley
Tugendhat, Christopher


Hunt, John
Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally
Turton, Rt. Hn. Sir Robin


Hutchison, Michael Clark
Orr, Capt. L. P. S.
van Straubenzee, W. R.


Iremonger, T. L.
Osborn, John
Vaughan, Dr. Gerard


Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Owen, Idris (Etockport, N.)
Vickers, Dame Joan


James, David
Page, Graham (Crosby)
Waddington, David


Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)
Page, John (Harrow, W.)
Walder, David (Clitheroe)


Jennings. J. C. (Burton)
Parkinson, Cecil



Jessel, Toby
Peel, John
Walker, Rt. Hn. Peter (Worcester)


Johnson Smith, G. (E. Grinstead)
Percival, Ian
Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek


Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)
Peyton, Rt. Hn. John
Wall, Patrick


Jopling, Michael
Pike, Miss Mervyn
Walters, Dennis


Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith
Pink, R. Bonner
Ward, Dame Irene


Kellett-Bowman, Mrs. Elaine
Pounder, Rafton
Warren, Kenneth


Kershaw, Anthony
Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch
Wells, John (Maidstone)


Kimball, Marcus
Price, David (Eastleigh)
White, Roger (Gravesend)


King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)
Prior, Rt. Hn. J. M. L.
Whitelaw, Rt. Hn. William


King, Tom (Bridgwater)
Proudfoot, Wilfred
Wiggin, Jerry


Kinsey, J. R.
Pym, Rt. Hn. Francis
Wilkinson, John


Kirk, Peter
Quennell, Miss J. M.
Winterton, Nicholas


Kitson, Timothy
Raison, Timothy
Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick


Knight, Mrs. Jill
Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James
Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard


Knox, David

Woodnutt, Mark


Lambton, Lord
Rawlinson, Rt. Hn. Sir Peter
Worsley, Marcus


Lane, David
Redmond, Robert
Wylie, Rt. Hn. N. R.


Langford-Holt, Sir John
Reed, Laurance (Bolton, E.)
Younger, Hn. George


Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry
Rees, Peter (Dover)



Le Marchant, Spencer
Rees-Davies, W. R.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Lewis. Kenneth (Rutland)
Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David
Mr. Reginald Eyre and


Lloyd, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey (Sut' nC' dfield)

Mr. Bernard Weatherill.




NOES


Abse, Leo
Fraser, John (Norwood)
Meacher, Michael


Albu, Austen
Freeson, Reginald
Mayhew, Christopher


Allaun, Frank (Sallord, E.)
Galpern, Sir Myer
Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert


Allen, Scholefield
Garrett, W. E.
Mendelson, John


Archer, Peter (Rowley Regis)
Gilbert, Dr. John
Mikardo, Ian


Armstrong, Ernest
Ginsburg, David (Dewsbury)
Millan, Bruce


Ashley, Jack
Gordon Walker, Rt. Hn. P. C.
Miller, Dr. M. S.


Ashton, Joe
Gourlay, Harry
Milne, Edward


Atkinson, Norman
Grant, George (Morpeth)
Mitchell, R. C. (S'hampton, Itchen)


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Grant, John D. (Islington, E.)
Molloy, William


Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)
Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)
Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)


Barnett, Joel (Heywood and Royton)
Griffiths, Will (Exchange)
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)


Baxter, William
Hamilton, James (Bothwell)
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)


Beaney, Alan
Hamilton, William (Fife, W.)
Morris, Rt. Hn. John (Aberavon)


Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood
Hamling, William
Moyle, Roland


Bennett, James (Glasgow, Bridgeton)
Hannan, William (G'gow, Maryhill)
Mulley, Rt. Hn. Frederick


Bidwell, Sydney
Hardy, Peter
Murray, Ronald King


Bishop, E. S.
Harper, Joseph
Oakes, Gordon


Blenkinsop, Arthur
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Ogden, Eric


Boardman, H. (Leigh)
Hart, Rt. Hn. Judith
O'Halloran, Michael


Booth, Albert
Healey, Rt. Hn. Denis
O'Malley, Brian


Bottomley, Rt. Hn. Arthur
Heffer, Eric S.
Oram, Bert


Boyden, James (Bishop Auckland)
Hooson, Emlyn
Orbach, Maurice


Bradley, Tom
Horam, John
Orme, Stanley


Broughton, Sir Alfred
Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Oswald, Thomas


Brown, Bob (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, W.)
Howell, Denis (Small Heath)
Owen, Dr. David (Plymouth, Sutton)


Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)
Huckfield, Leslie
Palmer, Arthur


Brown, Ronald (Shoreditch &amp; F'bury)
Hughes, Rt. Hn. Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles


Buchan, Norman
Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Parker, John (Dagenham)


Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen, N.)
Parry, Robert (Liverpool, Exchange)


Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)
Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Pavitt, Laurie


Campbell, I. (Dunbartonshire, W.)
Hunter, Adam
Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred


Cant, R. B.
Irvine, Rt. Hn. Sir Arthur (Edge Hill)
Pendry, Tom


Carmichael, Neil
Janner, Greville
Pentland, Norman


Carter, Ray (Birmingh'm, Northfield)
Jay, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Perry, Ernest G.


Carter-Jones, Lewis (Eccles)
Jeger, Mrs. Lena
Prentice, Rt. Hn. Reg.


Clark, David (Colne Valley)
Jenkins, Rt. Hn. Roy (Stechford)
Prescott, John


Cocks, Michael (Bristol, S.)
John, Brynmor
Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)


Cohen, Stanley
Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)
Price, William (Rugby)


Coleman, Donald
Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)
Probert, Arthur


Concannon, J. D.
Johnson, Walter (Derby. S.)
Rankin, John


Conlan, Bernard
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Reed, D. (Sedgefield)


Corbet, Mrs. Freda
Jones, Barry (Flint, E.)
Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)


Cox, Thomas (Wandsworth, C.)
Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Rhodes, Geoffrey


Crawshaw, Richard
Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn (W.Ham, S.)
Richard, Ivor


Cronin, John
Jones, Gwynoro (Carmarthen)
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony
Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda. W.)
Roberts, Rt. Hn. Goronwy (Caernarvon)


Cunningham, G. (Islington, S.W.)
Judd, Frank
Robertson, John (Paisley)


Cunningham, Dr. J. A. (Whitehaven)
Kaufman, Gerald
Roderick, Caerwyn E. (Br'c'n &amp; R'dnor)


Dalyell, Tam
Kelley, Richard
Rodgers, William (Stockton-on-Tees)


Davidson, Arthur
Kerr, Russell
Roper, John


Davies, Denzil (Llanelly)
Kinnock, Neil
Rose, Paul B.


Davies, Ifor (Gower)
Lambie, David
Ross, Rt. Hn. William (Kilmarnock)


Davis, Clinton (Hackney, C.)
Lamond, James
Sandelson, Neville


Davis, Terry (Bromsgrove)
Lawson, George
Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-under-Lyne)


Deakins, Eric
Leadbitter, Ted
Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)


de Freitas, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey
Leonard, Dick
Short, Rt. Hn. Edward (N'c'tle-u-Tyne)


Delargy, H. J.
Lestor, Miss Joan
Short, Mrs. Renée (W'hampton.N.E.)


Dell, Rt. Hn. Edmund
Lever, Rt. Hn. Harold
Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)


Dempsey, James
Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham, N.)
Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)


Dormand, J. D.
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Sillars, James


Douglas, Dick (Stirlingshire, E.)
Lipton, Marcus
Silverman, Julius


Douglas-Mann, Bruce
Lomas, Kenneth
Skinner, Dennis


Driberg, Tom
Loughlin, Charles
Small, William


Duffy, A. E. P.
Lyon, Alexander W. (York)
Smith, John (Lanarkshire, N.)


Dunnett, Jack
Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)
Spearing, Nigel


Eadie, Alex
McBride, Neil
Spriggs, Leslie


Edelman, Maurice
McCann, John
Stallard, A. W.


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
McElhone, Frank
Steel, David


Ellis, Tom
McGuire, Michael
Stewart, Rt. Hn. Michael (Fulham)


English, Michael
Mackenzie, Gregor
Stoddart, David (Swindon)


Evans, Fred
Mackie, John
Stonehouse, Rt. Hn. John


Ewing, Harry
Mackintosh, John P.
Strang, Gavin


Fernyhough, Rt. Hn. E.
Maclennan, Robert
Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. R.


Fisher, Mrs. Doris (B'ham, Ladywood)
McMillan. Tom (Glasgow, C.)
Summerskill, Hn. Dr. Shirley


Fitch, Alan (Wigan)
McNamara, J. Kevin



Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)
Mahon, Simon (Bootle)
Swain, Thomas


Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Taverne, Dick


Foley, Maurice
Marks, Kenneth
Thomas, Rt. Hn. George (Cardiff, W.)


Foot, Michael
Marquand, David
Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertlllery)


Ford, Ben
Marsden, F.
Thomson, Rt. Hn. G. (Dundee, E.)


Forrester, John
Marshall, Dr. Edmund
Tinn, James




Torney, Tom
Weitzman, David
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Tuck, Raphael
Wellbeloved, James
Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)


Urwin, T. W.
Wells, William (Walsall, N.)
Wilson, Rt. Hn. Harold (Huyton)


Varley, Eric G.
White, James (Glasgow, Pollok)
Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)


Wainwright, Edwin
Whitehead, Phillip
Woof, Robert


Walden, Brian (B'm'ham, All Saints)
Whitlock, William



Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Wallace, George
Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)
Mr. James A. Dunn and


Walkins, David
Williams, Mrs. Shirley (Hitchin)
Mr. John Golding.

Question accordingly agreed to.

Resolved,
That the Regulations made by Order in Council under the Emergency Powers Act, 1920 and dated 9th February 1972, a copy of which was laid before this House on 9th February, shall continue in force, subject however to the provisions of Section 2(4) of the said Act.

Orders of the Day — TRANSPORT (GRANTS) BILL

Considered in Committee.

[Miss HARVIE ANDERSON in the Chair]

Clause 1

GRANTS TO BRITISH RAILWAYS BOARD AND NATIONAL BUS COMPANY

Question proposed, That the Clause stand part of the Bill.

11.55 p.m.

Mr. Frederick Mulley: I do not wish to detain the House at this hour on a Bill which, as we explained on Second Reading, we want to see passed as soon as possible. The points we might have wished to make in Committee are clearly out of order because we want more money to be made available to both British Rail and to the National Bus Company, because we are extremely concerned about the future of public transport.
I hope that the Government will not just wait until the situation has got beyond repair. Following the events which have happened since we last debated this Bill, only a week ago, the grave crisis which faces British industry also means a grave crisis for British Rail. This will have its impact on the finances of the National Bus Company and our municipal undertakings.
Clearly neither the railways nor the bus operators will get out of it merely by putting up fares. We shall before the end of the year face a grave crisis in public transport. I wish the Government

had taken the decision to assist them on broad social and economic grounds and not merely for the limited purposes of the Bill. I hope the Government will bear all these matters in mind.

Mr. Ron Lewis: I do not intend to detain the Committee for very long because I spoke on Second Reading, but I wish to raise a small constituency point involving the bus company.
According to the Bill, £7 million is to be allocated to the National Bus Company, for which hon. Members on both sides are very grateful. Since much of my area is sparsely populated, the fares charged by Ribble Bus Company in Carlisle and Cumberland are much higher than those charged in other parts of the area. Mileage rates vary considerably from city to city and people in Carlisle feel they are being penalised because they have to pay more per mile than is paid in other parts of the Ribble area. We have had two bus fare increases since 1970, and a third increase is due on 1st March. We are perturbed that the Ribble Bus Company has decided to withdraw the off-peak fares. These off-peak fares were a boon to many of my constituents in the countryside of Cumberland.
I shudder to think what the increase might have been if this sum of £7 million had not been made available to National Bus Company. It will be interesting to know what proportion of the £7 million will go to the Ribble Bus Company to help subsidise the people of my constituency and other parts of the area. Even the local manager of the Ribble Bus Company has said he could not forecast what is likely to happen in six months' time. It appears to be highly likely that before the end of the year there could be another increase in Cumberland. Naturally, this will hit old age pensioners and those who have to use buses to get to and from the centre of the city. While we are grateful that £7 million is being given to the National Bus Company, I shudder to think what


is likely to happen by the end of the year, with fares ever on the increase.
I understand that, by the end of June, my part of the country will probably be the first major area within the ambit of the Ribble Bus Company to go over completely to driver-only buses. The outlook in Carlisle is very bleak. Bus fares look like increasing, while some services are being cut.
While we are grateful for small mercies, if I might attempt to take a leap into the future, I am perturbed to think that some of my constituents will have to face extortionate bus fare increases in addition to the one that is in the pipeline for 1st March.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Eldon Griffiths): If I may deal first with the points raised by the hon. Member for Carlisle (Mr. Ron Lewis), I cannot tell him what proportion of this grant will become available to the Ribble Company. It is a grant made to the National Bus Company as a whole. The Bus Company's arrangements with its subsidiaries are a matter of management, and it would be wrong of me to intervene in that.
I hope that the hon. Gentleman will use his best endeavours on behalf of his constituents to ensure that wage increases on the buses, which are responsible for a very large proportion of the additional cost of running the buses, are held down. That is the way in which the hon. Gentleman can serve his constituents best.
The right hon. Member for Sheffield, Park (Mr. Mulley), who has been very co-operative and helpful throughout all the stages of the Bill, raised a number of points. I must deal with two of them.
He said that he thought there should be more money. I am sure that he recognises that the purpose of the Bill is a quite limited and specific one. It is to enable the National Bus Company and the British Railways Board, against the background of the C.B.I. initiative to hold down fare increases, to do their statutory duty of breaking even one year with another. When my Department came to calculate the sums of grant which would be payable for that purpose, it had to have regard to the facts before it, and it would have been wrong to

come to the House asking for more money than was required for that specific purpose.

Mr. Mulley: My short point was that, in view of events which have occurred since the introduction of the Bill, the possibility of British Railways breaking even this year had disappeared, I should have thought.

12 midnight.

Mr. Griffiths: The Bill was introduced before the difficulties arose to which the right hon. Gentleman referred. The purpose of the Bill is simply, against the background of the C.B.I. initiative, to ensure that the statutory duty of the two nationalised undertakings can be fulfilled. I am certain that my right hon. Friend will bear in mind the effects of the present difficulties on the British Railways Board and the National Bus Company to such extent as they are relevant, but not in this Bill.
I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that his words never fall on stony ground. They have been heard, and they will be considered.

Mr. Will Griffiths: Originally, I had no intention of taking part in this debate. I came into the Chamber to listen to the speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Park (Mr. Mulley). However, the attitude of the Under-Secretary in response to the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle (Mr. Ron Lewis) was so intolerable that I felt that it should not be allowed to go without comment.
Let us consider what the hon. Gentleman said. First, he told my hon. Friend in an off-hand manner that he could not inquire where the £7 million would be spent. No doubt that is common practice. I dare say that that has been the answer of Transport Ministers since way back. But it would be a good thing if Ministers—especially Tory Ministers—took more interest in where public money is spent. As long as I have been a Member of the House of Commons I have had to endure speeches, not least from the hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds (Mr. Eldon Griffiths) who constantly upbraided my right hon. and hon. Friends, when they occupied the Treasury Bench, about their profligate handling of public money.
Now we have a Minister in this "new-look" Government who has brushed aside a perfectly reasonable request by my hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle, who is quite rightly concerned about the burden placed upon his constituents by this Government. whose policies have resulted in a constant escalation in the cost of living, who additionally now face increased transport fares—a matter of some importance to them—as to what proportion of that £7 million, which the Minister is blithely disposing of, may reasonably be attributed to the needs of Carlisle. That is not a matter which should be brushed to one side.
I anticipate that I may be told that this has been the common practice over the years. If so, it is wrong. It is no good saying that it is a matter of management. This is £7 million of public money, and a Member of Parliament is perfectly within his rights in asking a Minister what he knows about its disposal. The hon. Gentleman should give a better answer than that which he has given tonight.
I should like to comment on the Minister's absurd recommendation to my hon. Friend that the best contribution which he can make towards solving the problem of the people of Carlisle and West Cumberland is to go back to Carlisle and tell the transport workers not to ask for an increase in wages. I hope that there is somebody lurking in the Gallery—maybe in the Press Gallery—who still has some contact with agencies which will print in full in West Cumberland what the Minister said tonight. There could be no better exposure of the limitations of this Government and their callous disregard for what is happening to people like my hon. Friend's constituents than the Minister's speech tonight.

Mr. David Steel: Like the hon. Member for Manchester, Exchange (Mr. Will Griffiths) I had not intended to intervene in the debate. However, reverting to the Second Reading debate, I understand that the only reason no payment is being provided in the Bill for the Scottish Transport Group is that it has been remiss enough to carry out its statutory obligation to balance its books. This is the only interpretation which can be placed

on the Under-Secretary's remarks on Second Reading. If so, I should like to repeat what I said on that occasion.

First Deputy Chairman (Miss Harvie Anderson): Order. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not try to speak to the Amendment which is out of order.

Mr. Steel: I realise the difficulty, Mr. Deputy Chairman. We tried unsuccessfully to frame an Amendment which was in order.
On Second Reading, I asked the Under-Secretary why the National Bus Company was receiving £7 million and no payment was being made to the equivalent body north of the Border. I was told that the difference was that the National Bus Company did not anticipate being able to balance its books whereas its counterpart North of the Border did and therefore it would receive nothing.
I should like to reiterate that in future presumably we are to encourage the Scottish Transport Group to spend money on improving the quality of its services, possibly at the risk of going into debt, because then it will be favourably treated and perhaps receive something proportionate to the £7 million which is being paid to the National Bus Company in future Bills of this kind. Is that a correct interpretation to place on the words uttered by the Under-Secretary on Second Reading?

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 1 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 2 and 3 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Bill reported, without Amendment.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Miss Harvie Anderson): The Question is—

Rear-Admiral Morgan-Giles: Mr. Deputy-Speaker—

Mr. Frederick Mulley: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. On the point of order which the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Park (Mr. Mulley) was about to raise, I must inform the House that the Bill cannot be debated at this stage.

Rear-Admiral Morgan-Giles: The Third Reading of the Bill cannot be debated?

Mr. Deputy Speaker: No.

Motion made, and Question, That the Bill be now read the Third time, put forth-with pursuant to Standing Order No. 56 (Third Reading), and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time, and passed.

OVERSEAS INVESTMENT AND EXPORT GUARANTEES BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

Motion made, and Question put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 66 (Second Reading Committees), That the Bill be read a Second time.

Question agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Standing Committee pursuant to Standing Order No. 40 (Committal of Bills).

OVERSEAS INVESTMENT AND EXPORT GUARANTEES [MONEY]

Queen's Recommendation having been signified—

Resolved,
That, for the purpose of any Act of the present Session to authorise the Secretary of State to enter into certain agreements relating to overseas enterprises, and in particular to investment overseas, and to amend the Export Guarantees Act 1968, it is expedient to authorise—
(1) The payment out of money provided by Parliament or out of the Consolidated Fund of any expenses of the Secretary of State in connection with arrangements which concern investment overseas and which are for meeting non-commercial risks, so long as the aggregate of the liabilities of the Secretary of State under the arrangements does not exceed £750 million.
(2) The payment out of money provided by Parliament of any expenses of the Secretary of State in connection with arrangements which are for meeting abortive exploratory expenditure connected with overseas enterprises.
(3) Any increase in the sums which under section 9 of the Export Guarantees

Act 1968 are payable out of money provided by Parliament, or chargeable on and payable out of the Consolidated Fund, being an increase attributable to the amendment of section 4(1) of the said Act by increasing the limits on commitments under sections 1 and 2 of that Act to £6,200 million and £4,300 million respectively.
(4) Any payment into the Consolidated Fund.—[Mr. Anthony Grant.]

ADJOURNMENT

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr, Jopling.]

Orders of the Day — SEAHAM

12.12 a.m.

Mr. T. W. Urwin: At the end of a long day during which the House has been debating the very important subject of the emergency powers regulations, and calling into account, as many have done during the day, the dispute in the coalmining industry, it may be considered a little incongruous, and perhaps even a little impertinent, for me to be addressing the House on an Adjournment debate which has for its subject the question of coal and its distribution of coal as it affects that part of my constituency in which the Port of Seaham lies. However, I trust that the House will bear with me and realise that my constituency is heavily dependent, in the economic sense, upon coal as well as on the Port of Seaham which for many years has played an important part in the shipping of coal.
Since I first became a Member of the House in 1964, I have been actively involved on many occasions in the question of coal shipments from Seaham, an interest which has necessarily led to extensive correspondence with the National Coal Board, with the Central Electricity Generating Board, with the Seaham Harbour Dock Company, and with the local authority, Seaham Urban District Council. In addition, I have convened and participated in a variety of meetings involving representatives of those bodies. But, despite that enormous activity, I regret to say that coal exports from the port have continued to decline at quite an alarming rate.
The hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Lord Lambton) fully understands the work that has been done, because of his connection with the Seaham Harbour Dock Company, over many years to try to alleviate this situation. The Port of Seaham was expressly built as a coal port with an export-handling capacity of 3 million tons of coal a year. Coal was first shipped from the port in 1857 and it is indicative of the times that the total volume of exports in that first year was more than two-and-a-half times the quantity that flowed through in 1971. This is in itself an indictment of recent policies.
The port is surrounded by pits of high productive capacity. Many have been the subject of intensive development and modernisation at a cost of several millions of pounds. Some of these pits are literally situated upon the seashore with direct access to 550 million tons of proven coal resources under the North Sea. There are eight collieries, including one of the largest in the country, indeed in Europe, which employ, according to the 1970 figures issued by the Coal Board, 13,030 men with an annual average output of 5,175,400 tons.
The port is uniquely placed to take full advantage of this large output. It has been described as unquestionably the best-equipped coal-exporting port throughout the length of the East coast of Britain. Its coal is in demand by the steel industry in Britain and Europe, the C.E.G.B. and other major industrial users who need coal delivered by sea. The total output of these collieries was, and could now be, loaded directly into ships at the Port of Seaham with minimum costs for transporting the coal from the pit and with no additional capital investment by the Coal Board. Shipments from the port have declined from 2,314,000 tons in 1930 to 1,197,998 tons in 1965 and to what I thought would be the all-time low in 1971 of 320,000 tons. It is of greater interest to learn that in 1971 the N.C.B. shipped a total of 6,227,682 tons through the North-East ports of Blyth, Tyne, Wear and Seaham. Of this total, only 320,002 tons were shipped through Seaham, representing less than 5 per cent. of the total shipped through those ports. If 1971 were bad by any standards, the estimated throughput for 1972 for Seaham is 280,000 tons. This is despite written assurances from

the National Coal Board in July, 1970, that from 750,000 to I million tons would be shipped through Seaham each year over a three-year period, subject to the requirements of the Central Electricity Generating Board.
There is an undoubted paradox here, in so far as 1 million tons of coal per annum is being lifted from the Dawdon and Vane Tempest collieries, only a few hundred yards from the Seaham dock, and transported by rail to Sunderland South dock, a distance of between nine and 10 miles. This utterly Gilbertian situation, involving the by-passing of the excellent loading facilities at Seaham, is also the essence of economic madness.
During my dealings with this subject I discovered that the estimated cost of moving such coal, as far back as 1966, was 5s. per ton—a wholly unnecessary additional expenditure, which must inevitably be passed on to the consumer. It may well be that the Coal Board takes the view that the additional rail freight from Seaham to Sunderland is compensated for by the lower sea freights available on coal shipped to the south coast in larger vessels of 7,000 tons capacity which can berth at Sunderland, but that is not necessarily so. A new, vigorous and financially well-backed management team has recently taken over the Port of Seaham and is able and willing to ship coal from the port at competitive prices with those at Sunderland. The management has the ships available and there is the capability to load and turn ships around on a single tide more quickly than any port on the east coast. I submit that that reflects the lower sea freights available at Seaham.
Much has been said in the past concerning difficulty of access to the port, especially in bad weather, and this factor has occasionally been exploited against the port by potential users. In this connection I must emphasise that the dock facilities were specifically designed to load coal and similar bulk cargoes into ships up to 4,500 tons capacity and the management and personnel are quite capable of handling the total export requirements of the collective group of Seaham collieries at competitive rates which would produce substantial savings to the Central Electricity Generating Board and other consumers.
Additionally, the harbour master and chief pilot have confirmed that ships up


to 5,000 tons capacity have in the past been successfully and efficiently handled at Seaham. There is no valid reason why coal produced in the Seaham group of mines should not be entirely loaded and shipped at Seaham.
Apart from the sound economic reasons for securing this objective the important question of employment also needs to be considered. The former owners of the port—I pay tribute to the manful efforts that they made to maintain the labour force, despite the rapidly declining trade in the port—were inevitably eventually compelled to begin the process of redundancy. When I first went into the question of the problems of the port, in 1964, and participated in trying to resolve them, I recall that the labour force was about 400. The decline in exports has resulted in that labour force being reduced to about 100 men. That is in itself a serious blow to an area that is increasingly subjected to heavy unemployment. It is essential that this wastage of manpower should be halted. However, one must be objective in matters such as this, and I realise that unless the annual rate of shipment is quickly restored to a minimum of 1 million tons per annum, there will be a distinct possibility that the port will have to close.
If this were to happen, a valuable export facility would undoubtedly be lost, and this at a time when every effort should be made to ensure our complete participation in the drive to obtain new and expanding markets for coal. The Chairman of the N.C.B., Mr. Ezra, recently emphasised that attempts should be made to double our existing exports to Europe, particularly in view of our impending membership of the E.E.C. I wish to declare my interest in that I am against the idea of our entry, but if we are to join, then we should be exploring every avenue to ensure that we are able to export as much as possible.
A further advantage which could accrue if the Port of Seaham were kept open derives from the potential use in land reclamation schemes in the United Kingdom and Europe of colliery waste which is arising at the South Durham collieries at the rate of 2·5 million tons a year. This waste is comprised of stones and colliery dirt which are presently thrown on to the Durham beaches at

Seaham, Easington, Horden and Blackhall resulting in the most disgusting pollution of many miles of the Durham coastline. It has been widely reported that this pollution is worse than in any other part of the country, and it obviously prevents many thousands of people from enjoying what used to be relatively unspoilt beaches and facilities. These amenities could and should be made available again.
Successive Governments have spent much time examining the problem of pollution. The Secretary of State for the Environment is now looking into this problem and has indicated that he is investigating the whole question in depth. I appreciate, too, that the N.C.B. is searching for an alternative method of disposing of the waste. Seed is vital because I understand that by the mid-'seventies the volume of pit waste from this group of mines will increase to 3 million tons annually.
The possibility of using this waste material for land reclamation schemes—for example, in connection with Foulness—will have occurred to the Minister and the Department. Enormous quantities of this material could be absorbed in this way. In recent years the Dutch Government have used millions of tons of colliery waste in the construction of dykes in the Delta project, which has closed off several entrances to the Rhine near Rotterdam.
As participants in the disposal of colliery waste, the Port of Seaham informs me that the same loading facilities as for coal are availabe at the port to load shale, and that power barges are immediately available at the port to dispose of any unsold waste material at sea, which would at least put an end to the continuing pollution of the Durham beaches.
The Port of Seaham is well placed to handle this material, in addition to 1 million tons of coal, and this activity would provide employment for men recently made redundant in the port. There is a thriving angling club in the port and the new management has some sound ideas for the development of a small marina, but before any such scheme can go ahead we must remove this pollution from the beaches.
With these praiseworthy and laudable objectives in view, I call upon the Minister


and his colleagues in the Government to give perhaps a little more urgent consideration to what is a very difficult problem; and to try to ensure that the facilities which are available at the Port of Seaham are utilised to the fullest possible potential in the future.

12.30 a.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Eldon Griffiths): I am most grateful to the hon. Member for Houghton-le-Spring (Mr. Urwin) for having given me some advance warning about the matters which prompted him so eloquently to initiate this short debate. His main concern was with the diversion of coal traffic, mainly for power stations, from Seaham to Sunderland, and the consequent effect on the Seaham Harbour Dock Company and on employment in his constituency. I ought to explain at this point that it is my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry who has the oversight of the National Coal Board and the Central Electricity Generating Board. These are the nationalised bodies of whose policies the hon. Gentleman appears to have some criticisms to make.
To deal first with the effect of diversion of coal traffic to Sunderland, it is the unfortunate fact that coal traffic from the Wear and other traditional coal shipping points on the north-east coast has been declining for some years. Sunderland South Dock is the only loading point which remains in use, and its throughput has changed little since 1964—about a million tons a year. So it is not correct to say that since that time Sunderland has been taking more traffic from Seaham. In fact, the boot is on the other foot, in the sense that Sunderland has taken no more at all but rather that the National Coal Board has actually diverted through Seaham some coal for the south of England power stations such as Battersea and Deptford which otherwise it might have been expected to ship from elsewhere.
That said, it is true that there has been a drastic fall-off in traffic at Seaham and, like the hon. Gentleman, I regret this. But the reason has to be faced. It is that there is a rapidly declining demand for gas coal. In years gone by, Seaham was an important shipping centre for coal for gas works on the Thames and elsewhere in the south

of England, but today, as the hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well, scarcely any gas is being made in the south by the old carbonisation process. Virtually all the gas required in the south and the south-east comes from oil or, more importantly, from the North Sea or from the North African natural gas fields. So the gas coal traffic that used to play so large a part in keeping Seaham Harbour busy is simply not there any more.
Another factor which has undoubtedly operated to Seaham's disadvantage is its inability to take larger ships. The hon. Gentleman himself mentioned this fact, but I must tell him that it has become an increasingly important problem with the steady growth in the size of vessels in the coal trade. Seaham, I am told, cannot take ships of more than about 3,000 deadweight tons. Moreover, its ships can enter and leave only during relatively short periods before and after high water. By contrast, Sunderland can and does take ships up to 7,500 deadweight tons—

Mr. Urwin: According to my information, the fact that smaller ships use Seaham Harbour does not in any way affect the cost of coal shipments from Seaham to the Thamesside power stations.

Mr. Griffiths: I have just been telling the hon. Gentleman that the demand for gas coal on Thamesside is practically non-existent for that purpose, and the size of the ships makes a great deal of difference to cost. But, in the end, the choice of the port through which he sends his goods is undoubtedly that of the shipper, whether he be buyer or seller, and either as buyer or seller he has to arrange the freight and to pay for it.
He who pays the piper has the right to call the tune. That maxim holds good whether the person doing the buying is a private individual, a company or a nationalised industry. They must decide which port they wish to use, taking into account their financial position and their commercial judgment. The Government have no right to try to dictate to the National Coal Board or to the Central Electricity Generating Board, or to anyone else, how they should go about consigning individual shipments of coal from the Durham pits to the Thames power stations. This is a commercial judgment and there can be no question of the


Government seeking to intervene in the commercial decision.
I am every bit as sorry as the hon. Gentleman to witness the decline in the affairs of the Seaham Harbour Dock Company. I am told that the total traffic has declined from 814,000 tons in 1969, of which 758,000 tons was coal, to a total of about 400,000 tons in 1971, of which only 300,000 tons was coal. I should add that there are imports of timber and wood pulp and shipments of lime, mouldings and other bulk products, but these do not add up to very much. In the recent past the company's main source of revenue has been from the disposal of colliery refuse, but here, too, the total revenue has declined steadily and the last published accounts show that the operating surplus was very small indeed.
The House will know that the Dock Company, which I understand is now under new and vigorous management, has recently deposited a Private Bill seeking powers to borrow and to develop land. The hon. Gentleman may think that this is an indication of an intention on the company's part to pursue as best it can policies that will benefit its undertaking. I am sure that the company would have the hon. Gentleman's support in that direction.
I turn to the other matters raised by the hon. Gentleman, which come within the purview of my Department and are very close to my heart. I refer to the problem of the disposal of colliery waste and the concern of local people and, I need hardly add, my concern about the effect of this pollution on the environment of Seaham and the surrounding area. From time immemorial the classic method of disposing of colliery waste has been to tip it on the sea-shore. This has not been done simply to save money, although that has been a major consideration; the dumping of this waste on the shore has had the practical advantage of providing a measure of sea defence to protect the cliffs from the North Sea gales in winter.
That said, I agree that the tipping of this waste on the shore operates against the best interests of the community. Even on the most favourable view, tipping hardly improves the landscape—I should say, perhaps, the seascape.
Just as in the past green belts have been created to protect our cities and their environment, so my Department looks forward in the future to the creation gradually of blue belts of clean seas around our coasts. This is all the more important because of the increasing international interest being taken in the North Sea's condition. The amount of waste tipped on the shore in this area is currently about 1½ million tons a year. It will be readily understood that this is no small problem. There is no easy solution.
We have to remember that the National Coal Board has an economic interest in these matters which ought not to be overlooked, particularly because of its impact on unemployment. A number of schemes to reduce the pollution have been considered. There was the possibility of selling the waste and shipping it to Holland. Various other proposals have been put forward. My Department takes very seriously the pollution aspect. A working party of officials of all the Departments concerned and the National Coal Board has, for example, been examining all of the implications, financial and otherwise, of off-shore disposal of colliery waste in a better fashion. The Working Party has not yet completed its work and I cannot anticipate the terms of its report, but I assure the hon. Gentleman that Seaham, as a possible place for shipping the waste to other destinations, is one of the places that could conceivably benefit as a port if the intention could be realised of removing that waste and dumping it elsewhere.
I assure the hon. Gentleman that we appreciate the problems of Seaham to which he has drawn attention. I refer him to the White Paper on Financial Policy for Ports—Cmnd. 4794. I refer to hon. Gentlemen also to the fact that the new Dock Company is proceeding with energy and enthusiasm to help itself. If there is any advice which can be given by my Department or, better still perhaps, by the National Ports Council, to that company in its endeavours, I assure the hon. Gentleman that that advice will be very willingly made available.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at nineteen minutes to One o'clock.